The Othyb Chronicles
by Veravine
Summary: An alien seeking to rediscover his people's past ends up destroying his future. Prequel to the F Trilogy - The Fear, The Farewell, The Freaks. Capable of standing on its own, but has a better impact read after The Freaks.
1. Chapters 1 through 5

CHAPTER 1

I awoke to the sound of the _vhitah settling for the evening.My schedule was at its normal timing - sleep during the day and night, only awake for the evening and dawn.Of course, "evening" and "dawn" here was equivalent to nearly four days on the planet humans fondly call Earth, a place I knew and cared nothing about; I could stay awake for a great deal of time._

I straightened my back-bent knees and stood to my full fifteen-foot height.I scratched at a spot behind my forward horn, then under a patch of my thick mane of smoke-gray, my long, straight talons combing the thick strands at the same time.I yawned, baring my two-to-four-inch-long teeth even as my neck cramped suddenly, as it tended to when I first awaken; a screeching whine escaped my throat even as I hurried to shut my mouth.

Behind me I felt a smooth snout at my right wing, preening it for me.Only one would be so forward so quickly after I'd awakened; I spun quickly, keeping my tail tight to my body to keep from injuring the one thing that meant more to me than anything but for what we had created between us.She laughed as I swept her close with my wings."_Vreren," I murmured deep in my throat, earning a pleasant chuckle. "A little early, aren't you?"_

She moaned, shaking her head at me."With _Lingrii waking every few hours, how could any but the likes of you sleep?"She pressed her snout to mine, intertwining our forward horns and mid-horns for an intimate moment, then forced her way out of my wings.Her own were already preened and stretched, her mane, a pale pink that was almost white, already in order._

I never mated my _Vreren for her beauty; her wingspan was not more than twenty feet, her odd-colored mane - from which, along with the genes from my mother's unusually bright green mane, came the recessive genes that led to most of our __aatoju having their own unique mane-shades - rather unimpressive in anything but its color; her eyes were slightly oversized and a bland shade of pale green.But my __Vreren gave her hearts to me, and mine belonged to her without question, after a long time when the two of us would not have looked twice at each other without regret - after all, she was a logical scientist; I was a pilot infamous for being unconditionally reckless.Strangely enough, it was her stability and steadfast ways that made me love her so dearly; it was her inability to predict what I would do in an instant that made me so "aggravatingly irresistible"._

I didn't know a single pair who was happier than the two of us were.

Or, by then, six recently joined by a seventh.

_Fyvwiu was of course waiting for me.Like __Vreren, he had the terrible habit of being an early riser."Good evening, Father," he said, his dry tone suggesting that he hadn't thought I'd be waking at all.__Fyvwiu was a mystery to me; he had a monotony to him that put his mother's steadfastness to utter shame, but the same love of unplanned flight I had enjoyed even in the times when I had tried my hand at engineering."Sleep well?"_

"As well as I could, what with _Lingrii."I sighed, then chuckled."In spite of what your mother might ever say, I hear her too well.I just let __Vreren handle her.You know how much that terrible __aatojuik hates me."_

_Fyvwiu laughed."__Lingrii's exactly like __Klindas was at her age," he said, then groaned at the memory."__Grahk, that was a misery I'm glad not to face now!Bad enough __Sevelde."He groaned again."__dyu'Grahk, that girl is impossible!"He laughed."They're all bad, Father.Why'd you have to go and have daughters at all?"_

"You and _Brenjuum aren't any better for my health," I told him, my _

tone serious but my words anything but."_dyu'fel__'Grahk to you all!I'll never get you figured out, and __Sevelde will do everything in her power to make sure I never even __attempt to understand her.__Klindas is so shy her shadow makes her jump if she stays still too long, and __Brenjuum...!You'd think he thought with his talons for lack of anything between his horns!And now, __Lingrii refuses to sleep when any Bayetai in half their head and worth a mane and tailblade would, calling every last __seentikret after her... it's a wonder __Vreren and I stand any of you."_

"It's a wonder you and _Vreren stand each other, __Jirrell," an amused voice spoke behind us."Much less any of us brats of yours."_

"Indeed," another voice spoke up, chuckling.I turned, grinning equally from the welcome voices and familiar, beloved scents."A punctual pilot without common pride in common sense; a female _trahdarhk and permanently apprentice __mrwiheiu; an engineer and apprentice __trahdarhk - tohis sister - without any self-control; a skittish __mrwiheiu who's so small it's a wonder the very air doesn't tear her apart; and a time-disoriented __aatojuik, born of the most hopelessly insane pilot and incessantly stubborn rock-skull of a scientist this poor world has ever seen?"_

"Good to see you too, old geezer."I rubbed my horn against _Lydyiuh's with as much affection as I could muster, half-awake as I was and without a thing in my stomachs.I hadn't even given time to fully preen my wings yet.His companion, a young, barely mature, starkly beautiful female with a long mane of strangely dark lavender that made her look far too much older than she truly was (although her natural scowl didn't help make her look any younger) rubbed her snout to mine as she had ever since she was __Lingrii's age.__Sevelde and I had always been inseparable, since the day she first looked uponme and simply stared with oversized, infant's eyes that even after years of hard effort to reach harder goals had never lost their golden glow, tainted with only the faintest of green hues that seemed to swirl with a life of their own.__Sevelde had her mother's slightly oversized eyes, but unlike __Vreren, who was plain where __Sevelde was stark, the look made her stunning.Unfortunately for young males - a great deal of which met her through her elder and younger brothers - her only passion was for the honor of being the only female __trahdarhk in known history.__Trahdarhk literally translates to "protectors of tradition" - simply put, the __trahdarhk are a select elite in wing and eye-hand-tail coordination, strength, agility, and intelligence chosen to learn traditional but otherwise obsolete hand-to-hand and weaponry skills.In simple terms, shocktroops on a world in peace.Most of the time, they were simply called "traditional artists", their agile routines seen more as a dance than a defense.__Sevelde was unusual in that most females are more interested in the present and future than the tradition-laden past.No one publicly spoke against her becoming __trahdarhk, and none now spoke against her ability as one of the greatest: she put her natural edge in feminine agility and size to use against masculine strength._

I loved _Sevelde dearly, so dearly that I never cared that she never once called me "Father"._

"Managed to get him up so early, _Fyvwiu?" she asked, grinning."I'm _

surprised you got cloud-head here up at all."She poked at my arm with one of her talons."I don't see how you and _Brenjuum and __Klindas can sleep so much.There's not a doubt in my mind where that lazy brother of mine got _

his talent for sleeping through morning exercises."

"Or where you got yours for starting them at unearthly hours," I 

retorted."You don't let the sun rise even a microsecond earlier than you."

"It's not allowed," she replied, her voice almost prim.I had to chuckle, just listening to my warrior-girl acting void-headed."We have that understanding, and I would appreciate it if we didn't need to discuss it."

"Are _Klindas and __Brenjuum awake?" I asked her._

She snorted."Oh, _Brenjuum better be awake, or he can forget sleeping in the morning!As for __Klindas...." She nodded upward."There's her flock there.And there's no way they could have two that small with wings like that."_

_Lydyiuh looked upward, his gray-tan mane falling back over his wide shoulders, where his impressive forty-foot span lay folded in a cloak-like fashion over his shoulders, a garment of power and prestige not usual to find in someone so earthly as a medical scientist.He'd been a friend of my father when they were young; he had streaks of glass-like hairs showing in his mane that no one was ever quite willing to mention.He had a rather difficult mate I had never had the honor - or stupidity - to be in the presence of for more than a few moments at a time and therefore never bothered to remember her name; she and my father had had too many differences to stand each other, so she refused to have anything to do with me."She could be asleep up there, and no one would know it," he chuckled."__Klindas is a natural __mrwiheiu.The winds are the same to her as the ground beneath our feet."_

"Better," _Sevelde corrected."That girl should never come down."_

_Fyvwiu's expression darkened."I'd like to see you try telling __Hraivret that."_

I scowled."You needn't worry about him, boy."

"Hardly," he replied, glancing at me."He'd never think of her with you, me, _Sevelde, Mother... and especially __Brenjuum."He chuckled, the dark mood passing over him quickly.__Fyvwiu always hated dwelling on dark thoughts, even though more often than not he was the one to speak them aloud."It's almost sweet to see him claw the daylights out of any who think a single compliment __Klindas' way."_

"Sweet and wrong," I reminded him, doing my best to appear stern."No better than when _Sevelde was her age, __Fyvwiu."_

He cringed slightly at the memory, turning slightly violet in the face.

"I was never so vicious as that."

"You were so much worse that _I had to knock the sense into you, _

because no one else would," _Sevelde told him in a flat tone, but she was smiling almost wickedly.Her eyes with their swirling green motes sparkled with excitement."Come on, fool, we've got to make ourselves scarce.__Lydyiuh and__ Jirrell need to discuss... __it."__Fyvwiu smiled in response and, stopping short, he spread his wings and leaped into the air.__Sevelde uttered a short growl of annoyance and hurried to follow; with her standing as an apprentice __mrwiheiu - although, as __Lydyiuh had pointed out, her stoppingher training in that kept her from being anything more than that - she caught him easily just before he reached the gust level and, grabbing his arms, threw him upward in midair, losing altitude herself but at the same time catching him in the gust level, where he tumbled until he was able to get his wings above him again.Whatever he might have said about the indignity was thankfully lost to the winds._

_Lydyiuh smiled at me."They never change, do they, dearest?"The word didn't truly mean "dearest" - it was - is - a term of affection without exact translation that __Lydyiuh often used for me._

I laughed."Only when you least want them to," I replied.Then I changed the subject to what _Sevelde had so kindly given us privacy to speak of."So what is the news?"_

_Lydyiuh grinned."The good news is that you're head pilot.The bad news is, __Vreren has to go, too."_

"_Vreren?" I echoed.I could not believe my immense fortune."What?Why?"I snorted a little."And why, tell me, is that so bad?"_

He shrugged a little."The Council chose those to go.Seventy-one, total.And _Vreren makes the one that goes over seventy.The bad part," he said, grinning even more, "is that there are seventy-two going."_

"Seventy-three," I interrupted him even though the thought that had come to me prevented me from truly listening in the first place."_Lydyiuh, there's no way we can leave __Lingrii behind.She's too young, and without __Vreren, no one will sleep within __ac'Blar.If we cannot bring __Lingrii, neither _

of us are going."

"That's why there are seventy-_two," he assured me patiently."Truly, I didn't see why five of you got to go and poor __Vreren had to be left behind.I noticed, however, that there were no botanists.So I placed her name on the list for it, and no one asked any questions until it got to __Ernrida."__Ernrida - that was the name I never could remember.__Lydyiuh's mate, __Ernrida, hadn't liked my father all that much.With him gone, it befell me to bear her animosity with a smile.For some reason, however, it ended with me; ever since __Sevelde became __trahdarhk she acted as if my brood was hers rather than __Vreren's."The bad news part of it is that the little __seentifekeso has to keep twenty-three others awake for all hours."  
"I think they can put up with it," I laughed."After all, __Sevelde is used to it, and she'll keep the __trahdarhk in line; __Fyvwiu and I are well enough with it and that leaves us without pilots worth enough to complain about it; __Klindas gets along well enough with her, and won't stand a word said against her-"_

"Reminds me of her brothers that way," _Lydyiuh remarked dryly._

"And goodness knows if _Brenjuum so much as hears a whisper of complaint we'll have him at somebody else's throat.But I meant that without seriousness, friend.After all, with all of you aboard, it will only be sixteen verses six and an __aatojuik - seven, including myself.With __Sevelde and __Brenjuum as two of the seven... well, I don't think there's much you need to worry about."_

"Can you believe it, _Lydyiuh?" I asked him, looking up into the darkness-tinted sky."The homeworld.At last."I pointed upward, where a dim star glowed in the constellation known as __Urtai'dur - the closest translation is "short blade".It was a vaguely triangular constellation that always pointed toward the northern pole, and could always be seen in the northern hemisphere, even this close to the equator._

"It was so changed, they kept dismissing the planet as the wrong one." _Lydyiuh, too, was without words to describe the sensation of knowing, after ions, that, at last.... home."The records seem to show it more to the south-western skies.Besides, it was two moons short, the axis and orbit all off...."_

"... and the whole time, one problem had caused the other," I finished."Collision of an asteroid threw the entire planet out of alignment.Probably shed the moons."

"I don't need the specifics, boy," _Lydyiuh chuckled."Goodnessknows I was there, too, when they explained the all of it."_

"I just can't believe that it was found... now."I continued to stare at the dull, unextraordinary star that shown like so many, yet would now never be lost again."In this lifetime of all lifetimes, at last... _home."_

"A little awe-struck, dearest?" he laughed.

"Aren't you?" I returned."Can you believe that you're alive to see this day?"

"We're leaving just before nightfall's end," he said."And no, it is too 

difficult to believe for me to trust in it just yet."His tone turned dark."My one worry is of the _orba themselves.If we meet them.What will they think - if they're even there?"_

"What do you mean, if they're there?" I asked, astounded."They were a peaceful, advanced, shape-shifting race.That's how we evolved so quickly, after all.How could you suggest they'd kill each other off?"

"A collision of that sort can lead to vast disaster, _Jirrell," he said darkly."And advancement didn't stop many of our ancestors from never seeing the light of morning of Firstday.And just because they were peaceful doesn't mean the rest of the universe is.Goodness knows it isn't, what with brain-sucking Yeerks and cannibal vacuum-mouthed Taxxons and meddling, single-minded Andalites and whatever-else there might be plaguing space out there.Besides, who's to say the records are right, we're wrong, and we're headed a billion miles out of our way for nothing?"_

I shook my head, smiling faintly, almost oblivious of _Lydyiuh's rhetorical question.__Lydyiuh might be a brilliant doctor, but he has the same biases about other life as almost everyone has.I've always had a difficulty classifying anything in groups - only individuals matter, to me.Goodness knows, Bayetajin are as different as... well, __Hraivret (a haughty, close- minded politician without a wit worth half his wingspan, much less his length of mane - who was unfortunately as much a shoe-in for this mission as __Lydyiuh and I put together) and __Lydyiuh (an open-minded, down-to-earth medical scientist with more than enough gifts to make even his forty-foot span and glass-streaking, nearly body-length mane seem paltry compared to his true worth)."I admit, the Taxxons __are rather single-minded about food, and the Andalites __are somewhat self-righteous, but they mean well enough.But 'Yeerks' are only myth.And there is no talking against the __shek."_

_Lydyiuh dismissed the thought with a wave of his hand."The __shek are different.They are robots, not flesh.And no, I'm not saying Bayetai are near perfect.But at least we're not out there killing each other."_

"Feelings are somewhat inhibiting in that way," I agreed tonelessly."Feelings" has a double-meaning for Bayetajin; on one talon, it means the same as it does for any other race - emotions, or hunches.But on another one, we all have "a Feeling" for those related most immediately to us - our parents, siblings, _aatoju, and __deva-noju, although some more sensitive Bayetajin also feel __breeiv - cousins, nephews, and nieces, sometimes even __their __aatoju.But that is rare.These "Feelings" mean one thing - we know when they die.There is no medical explanation for feeling a family member's death, and no limit to the distance it can be felt over - at least, none that has been found.All that is known is that when a family member dies... there is pain.Mostly pain, not just emotionally but physically as well.One can't breathe, can't think past the pain, can't even stand.It's been known for weaker Bayetajin to die from Feelings - a rather unfair way to die, I think, what with the knowledge of a loved one dying just before one dies as well.Not a good way to start oblivion, but I suppose it doesn't matter there."But everyone has their reasons for what may be," I ended the subject._

_Lydyiuh shook his head at me."Ah, you're ever-present 'To each their own' philosophy, pilot?"_

"It hasn't failed me, that I remember," I replied with a careless grin, the one I was always told makes me look dashing.I don't know - I think it 

made my face look lopsided and my eyes like slivers of _crugraht._

Everyone but _Vreren liked it, though - she always groaned when I grinned like that, and shook her head - so I used it a lot._

_Lydyiuh shook his head and groaned, just as __Vreren would have if it was she I was talking to."You __are hopeless, has anyone told you that?"_

"Every time they call me by name," I said, being quite literal.

I didn't know then why my name meant "hopeless".Many thought it was for my habit of being spontaneous and individual, for setting precedents and not looking to the traditional past as a guide to living, as Bayetajin tend to do, but to the ever-changing present and always unpredictable future.It was especially unusual that a male would choose such a thing.They thought it was for the hopelessness of ever making me just another handsome - although I frown to admit that -, if somewhat sturdy, Bayetajin.

# CHAPTER 2

Carrier vessels of the small fleet we kept - "we" being Bayetai and the few _shek that populated this planet even before our ancestors came - all looked capable of flapping their wings.We only had a small fleet because all they were used for before this day I was living was to scout the atmosphere and moons for intruders that never came. They appear, in terms the human race - which I still was oblivious of - would understand, like a cross between a dragon and a paper airplane._

As I always did before boarding any vessel, I admired the beauty of it.The one I'd be flying was a carrier ship, as they were officially known as, but most called them warships because they are heavily armed.Long, backswept wings are the predominant trait, under which are tucked the main zero-space engines.Very aerodynamic and sleek for its more-often-than-not atmospheric flights, and impressive to just look at: a semi-triangular bridge forward on a tapered "neck" section rigged with at least three airlocks set on trigger switches to shut at the slightest hint of a breech; a somewhat tubular mid-section, and a Dracon shredder on a long "tail" that sweeps over the main section and bridge like a gigantic Andalite's tail.The "tail" is a piece of ingenuous technology the _shek provided us with, and is actuallyfour Dracon shredders layered one upon another, that if the one in function is blasted off or ruined - for it is very common in battle to aim at the weapons, just as much at the engines and the core - there are three back-ups, already primed and ready to take its place.The broken one will just fall away if it is damaged beyond use, and can be retrieved later if necessary.The main normal-space engines look very much like lesser wings, arching up and over to curl into an elliptical half-"circle", while the small, tunnel-space ones are farther forward and look like half-spheres, arranged in a semi-circle.It greatly resembles, without tunnel-space configurations and unusual Draconshredder, a present-day Yeerk bladeship, but our carrier ships looked far more like dragons than battle axes, thanks to the curvature of the "wings".On board were some of the more common ships - small, two-person crafts that look like little more than quicksilver pods, with the same "melted-wing" type engines for normal-space as the larger ones and the wing-like main Z-space engines, but no "bowl" engines, being too small to equip for tunnel-space.I was as much an expert at both vessels, beaten in knowledge only by __shek, who, unlike me, cannot forget.The key to it was that I had been a fully-trained engineer before I turned pilot.I know how every last system on those vessels works.I improved on them by tinkering on my own, and those changes that proved useful I filed for engineers-by-trade to implement as they wanted to.As far our intraplanetary civilization was concerned, I'm afraid I must admit to you that I was a hero.There are no wars on our planet - no religion, although prayer is heard of, but not to anything in particular except, perhaps, ancestors - no murder - no civilly-created chaos that has caused death.After evolving for ions with Feelings, we'd learned to get along, or pay the price by killing each other off entirely for vengeance._

But I have always believed that this was actually a flaw, not a gift.Because my people have avoided all these things, when we meet races with them, most just dismiss them as savages.Since _all races we've met are such, it is easy for everyone to dismiss __all other races the same way.I think, sometimes, that it is simply our nature to despise other races.Only one race we have never met - but were going to, I was sure of it, even if __Lydyiuh was too skeptical - is there no such dismissal: the __orba.Our parent-race._

You see, we evolved from a shape-shifting race known only as the _orba.From ancient texts and pictures they were thought to have been much like ourselves, but a third the size, with three horns, not four - that is to say, they had no small forward horn on the end of their snouts, and an actual horn rather than a ridge - and completely without blades - as the sharp, serrated ridges made of bone that protrude from our elbows and knees, as well as a long, heavy, solid bone at the end of our tails, like a sharpened club crossed with a gigantic sword, are called.Bayetai, unlike our ancestors, also have incredibly long, almost perfectly straight talons from our fingers and toes.Because they had overcome most diseases and had outlived their natural predators, the population grew so much that nearly half thepopulation formed a mass exodus, traveling via tunnel-space to another planet in another solar system.However, their knowledge of the seemingly inhabitable planet was flawed - mostly through the unknown bioelectrical field of the planet that disrupted the molecular integrity of any who attempted to shapeshift, killed off most of the foodstuffs they brought with them, and rendered much of their technology useless.Nearly three-quarters of them died; two-thirds of those that died did so because many ships crash-landed, their systems shut down from the bioelectrical field.For the vastly different gravity they grew taller and thinner, their bones growing very hollow but more dense, and the lack of (useful) technology led to more primal adaptations, including the tail blade for protection against predators - actually, the tail blade began simply by merging the last few vertebrae of the tail, while the skin simply stopped growing there - and the other blades for harvesting food.These changeswere helped along through careful use of the shifting ability, which was lost within only a few generations, thanks to the cursed field of the planet - __our planet, the one we share with the __shek.That is why the strongest Bayetajin derogative, __seentikefso, is also the word for that field.We are __Bayetai now - "Wanderers"; "Nomads", if translated very loosely.Either that, or "The Lost"._

But now, astronomers had discovered, at long last, the location of our original planet, a search that has been fruitless for hundreds of generations.It had changed, too, just as we had - before it had been disregarded as a different world because the axis and orbit and rotation were off and it had two too few moons, _and that there were too few planets in the system, but through mathematical calculations, it was discovered that the latter fact had led to all the rest; an asteroid had collided with the planet, throwing offall other orbits, causing two of the moons to collide and set a chain reaction on the planet itself, tilting it at a different angle and speeding its rotation even as the planet lost the capability to support life in any regions but a thin, impossibly deep ravine that split open at its equator._

So now, it was certain that the planet - a small, unassuming planet 

that seemed to be in the middle of nowhere - was truly home, it was up to me, _Jirrell, the best pilot and father of as close to a military leader as the Bayetai could claim, to lead a convoy to return, to see, at last, after so many eons..... the __orba._

*

There were three vessels, each bearing twenty-four of the greatest minds, traditional warriors, pilots, and _mrwiheiu.(__Mrwiheiu, by the way, are 'wing-flyers' - those that show unusual (and sometimes, almost unnatural) talent at flying, not as pilots, but with their own wings.__Klindas, being almost half the size of a normal Bayetajin her age but with wings of only slightly stunted span, was one of those with us, as I had no doubt she would be.)The trip was, surprisingly, only six days - a little under an Earthen month - by tunnel-space._

Tunnel-space, if you've never heard of it, is another knowledge salvaged mostly through the efforts of the _shek.It is a complicated technology that involves "skimming" a ship through the border between space and time, like a flat-sided rock skipping over the barrier of air and water.Like rocks skipping over water, the slightest imperfection or wrong angle means falling under the surface, or, in the case of tunnel-space, "falling" back into z-space.Normal space is too dense for the transition to occur; one needs the pure emptiness of anti-space to reach tunnel-space._

But enough of that.I could go on for days if I continue.And, as I said, by traveling via tunnel-space, it only took six to reach.... _home._

I personally thought we should meet our ancestors with dignity, but I had long ago been outvoted; when we broke the thicker atmosphere of our former homeworld, we set off explosions in the atmosphere, like fireworks; _mrwiheiu tried aerial aerobatics, but found it difficult to fly at all.I piloted with a grimace on my face, muttering under my breath."Stupidity, all of this," I swore."Complete and utter stupidity.Haven't we __any dignity as a race?Haven't we a __shred of self-respect?"_

_Fyvwiu smiled briefly as he compensated for a particularly steep corkscrew maneuver I'd thrown the ship into."After all we've lost, we'd better have __something to show the ancestors," he answered my rhetoric."Even if it __is rather silly."_

Still, it was good, flying with my elder son.True, it was more natural for me to fly without a co-pilot when I took off on my own craziness, but with the carriers it was always best to have a co-pilot.I could have handled it well enough on my own, but _Fyvwiu deserved some time to prove his worthiness on this mission.And he was, more than I had originally thought he would, by keeping pace easily with my off-the-cuff performance in the thick air.It slowed the ship considerably, but it wasn't anything a little extra compensation had any trouble with._

Finally, at last, I heard _Hraivret's usually unwelcome voice as he strode onto the bridge."Without the damned field, sensors are almost useless," he told us, although we could tell quite easily from the steadystream of curses coming from the young Bayetajin who was stationed to monitor sensors."We can tell, however, that a great deal of lifeforms are starting to congregate below.Prepare to land within a safe distance."_

"At last," I said.

"Is there a problem, pilot?" _Hraivret asked in that irritating way of his._

"Just my pride," I replied, shrugging my wings slightly."Preparing to land and sending landing signal to other vessels.We'll be on the ground before you can find the airlock."

"Amusing, _Jirrell," __Hraivret said, not sounding amused at all._

"He tries," _Fyvwiu offered._

# CHAPTER 3

I stood behind _Hraivret, with __Fyvwiu to my left, so that we could accept whatever the __orba wished to say of our flight.It had taken forever to find a place that the three ships could settle together; but we had found one, and now were getting ready to exit.Diplomatic to a fault when dealing on a short-term basis, __Hraivret was an all-purpose person for beginning any discussion, then fading into the woodwork; that was why it was he who broke the tertiary airlock of the carrier while the other two vessels were under strict orders that absolutely no one was to disembark.The lack of the bioelectrical field foiled the inner-planetary sensors - after all, without a need to land on a planet other than our own, why grid the sensors to scan without compensating for the cursed field? - but the number of lifeforms outside, and the organized distribution of them, was encouraging.If Bayetai were adapted to sweat upon becoming agitated, I would have been sweating a great deal.My stomachs were upon themselves, I was so queasy with unease.I set my jaw and swallowed heavily.Only the look of utter terror on __Fyvwiu's paled face eased my own terror within.What would the __orba think of us?That was on my mind more than anything else.Here we were, the descendants of those they'd probably given up on ever seeing again.It never crossed my mind that they might have forgotten those that left generations upon generations ago. More to the point and obvious enough to me now, it also never occurred to me that __we had ever made any mistake.All I cared about was: what would their reaction to us be?_

_Hraivret stepped through the airlock when it finally opened, in spite of the terrible glare that greeted us; the sun was so much brighter here!I shaded my eyes, before realizing that it'd look stupid of me to do so, so I weathered the pain in the back of my eyes until my third eyelid darkened enough for the pain to ease, and for my vision to clear._

_Hraivret suddenly gave a loud cry, stepping back so that he nearly crashed into me."__Seentifesco!" he hissed, horrified.My eyes adjusted to the glare but I myself shocked at the sound of __Hraivret swearing - as a rule, he didn't - I looked out._

And nearly swore myself.

They were half the height of a Bayetajin, and, though anything but fat, stocky to slender did not compare the difference between the build of the short creatures to a Bayetajin.But from there and the symmetrical likeness, any likeness to Bayetai - or _orba - ceased.Many had only two horns, although some had three, but none even resembled the horns of an __orba - they all raked forward like miniature tail blades, rather than backwards with a split at the end, and all were lined up in a row, every one of them the same length as the rest of them.Rather than five fingers and toes like __orba were supposed to or three of each like Bayetai, they had four.Their skins were unnaturally dark, almost black.Spines raked from the end of their tails, which had no tailblades at all - just the various spikes.Their heads were bald of any resemblance to the manes that Bayetai have always felt so proud of - they appeared completely hairless, in fact - and showed no signs whatsoever of ever having wings.But most frightening were the blades they did have - long, hideous, singular blades raked from not only the elbows and knees, but wrists and ankles as well.Their talons were not worthy of being called stubs - short, curved things that looked very incapable of protecting the creatures from predators.They were a ragged-looking bunch, most scarred and nearly all of them dirty, as if they were in the middle of a battlefield.That was the most frightening thing about them - the scars.The __evidence of __violence.Violence that appeared to have been done __to themselves, by themselves._

Most frightening, that is, after their eyes.Frightened, confused, half-blind....

And the look to them....

These... creatures.... were stupid.

Relatively speaking, to ourselves.Intelligent enough to be sentient, yes, but not nearly close to our level.

_Fyvwiu leaned closer to me; he, too, was stricken at the sight of the things that surrounded the ship."Where are the __orba?" he whispered, his voice sounding as if he'd been physically hurt._

I didn't put into words how much I was at a loss as well.What _were these... things?_

_Hraivret let out a moan, almost falling into my arms but catching himself."The collision!" he breathed.Suddenly he threw a hand at the crowd of aliens, who backed away in surprise at the sudden movement."__This is all that remains of our ancestors!" he howled._

One of the three-horned ones, somewhat smaller than the average-size of the creatures, bobbed their head a bit.It took a tentative step forward, away from its kind, and toward the loading ramp._Hraivret backed farther into the ship as the rest of the creatures backed away as well, leaving the little, pathetic but dangerous-looking thing very much alone."Speak, you?" it murmured.Its accent was as severe and feral as the creature looked, but that it was understandable at all was impossible.After so much time... their language was still recognizable to ours?Or was it the experimental translator the __shek had implanted in my head that I heard?_

_Hraivret, however, wasn't interested in miracles, if there were any.He was interested in his own safety.He'd come to deal with far-advanced ancestors, not Neanderthal de-evolutional byproducts of an ancient disaster."Get it away!" he squealed._

"_Nahar!" I snapped at him.That word - the closest concept a human would understand of that word being, "Stop everything or I'll make you severely regret it!" - didn't seem to have been lost, or perhaps it was just the unmistakable tone of my voice; the aliens drew even farther back.The small, three-horned one stood its ground, though it was shaking, visibly frightened and perhaps too much so to run away.I pulled __Hraivret bodily back into the ship, shoving him into __Fyvwiu's arms, and stepped forward myself.The bravest of the aliens cocked its head a bit to the side, confused and no doubt frightened, considering I was even taller than __Hraivret.Very noticeably taller.I swallowed, then said as slowly as I could, "My name is __Jirrell.You are....?"_

It cocked its head farther to the side, then straightened it and hit its unplated chest with one malformed fist."I Sel Clemen!" it said.It bobbed its head, as it had before stepping forward, then added in a voice I could only describe as hesitant, "What, you?"It jabbed a short, muscular finger at me.

I smiled shakily, squinting my eyes and raising my eye ridges to soften my expression as much as I could.After five of my own, it was easy to see that talking to this creature was very much like speaking to a very young _aatojuik who only understands perhaps twenty to fifty words, and speaks only ten.I pointed to myself, saying, "We are Bayetai." I pointed to it."You?"_

"Bayetai, you?"I nodded.It paused, then mimicked the nod."Hork-Bajir," Sel Clemen said at last, spreading its arms wide, "we are."

"Hork-Bajir?"I looked up, startled, only to find myself, seeing, to my horror, the other two ships with their loading ramps down even thoughthey'd had the strictest order to stay aboard and air-tight.Right then, the forty-eight Bayetai from the other two vessels were pouring out into the crowd of Hork-Bajir.A cry of what could only be alarm spread through the group of aliens faster than my people did, nearly drowning out the sound of the voice of _Lydyiuh as he pondered their name."Of course! 'Remainders'!" he translated the usage of the still-common - but mangled - language.__Orakylblajra meant something of the nature of "those left behind".Trust __Lydyiuh to understand something so... abused."They are what became ofthe __orba."He didn't sound very happy about being proven right.I didn't blame him._

A young engineer I didn't know snarled wordlessly, flaring out their small, fifteen-foot wingspan.The Hork-Bajir backed away, startled; _Hraivret and I had come out into the open with our wings folded over our shoulders like capes, and suddenly one of us..._

I was startled when I came upon an accurate description of what we must have looked like to the Hork-Bajir - elongated giants with too few digits and not enough blades and malformed tails, not to mention thick growths of hair at the top of our heads and horns that were all wrong and talons more like tree branches than claws.And now we had wings.

A Hork-Bajir let out a hiss."_Fhath!" it screeched.Four Hork-Bajir simply bolted, bounding away on their back-turned knees.The one next to the one who swore - the tone, no matter who used it, was unmistakable - leaped at the engineer._

# CHAPTER 4

"They're attacking!" a pilot from another vessel yelled, baring his teeth in alarm.A doctor screamed, unfolded his nearly thirty-span wings, and tried to get above the group, to fly to safety, but the gravity was too heavy; he couldn't even lift off.He screamed again in blind panic.

"No!" I cried, but it was too late.I watched hopelessly as the uneasy understanding I'd achieved with Sel Clemen fell apart instantly; half the Hork-Bajir was running, the other half was charging, while the one called Sel Clemen looked trapped in between.Behind me, I heard _Hraivret squeal in terror.__Mrwiheiu from the other ships were taking off; soldiers of the traditional arts were jumping at the chance to put their previously useless talents with their talons and teeth to use; various engineers and scientists were scattering.I tried to reach out and grab Sel Clemen to pull it out of possible harm's way when I was pushed from behind by an eager __trahdarhk.I bent over double, and the soldier leaped over my back, his talons barely missing my horns.__Hraivret, blind with panic, ran out into the fray, others right after him.Before I had time to regain my sense of balance, seventy-one Bayetai were towering over fierce little Hork-Bajir that, it was obvious to see, outnumbered us near three to one, and, in spite of the patheticness of their claws, knew more than well enough how to use their arm- and leg-blades, even their tails, for defense and death."No - stop!" I shouted, but my voice was lost in the chaos.I set my jaw in frustration.I was angered to suddenly see a familiar face seeming to enjoy himself.I leaped off the ramp to the ground, shoving Sel Clemen toward it and relative safety, and pushed another Hork-Bajir out of my way to grab the familiar person."__Brenjuum!" I snarled.He looked at me in shock, his surprise at the venom of my voice making him forget anything else."What in the name of the __orba do you think you're __doing, boy?"_

The Hork-Bajir I had shoved suddenly stood straight; I saw the upward movement from the corner of my eye."What you do?" it asked, as if it had completely forgotten the battle that raged."He yours!You attack _us, not selves."I would not realize the insightfulness of that confused remark until much later._

_Brenjuum stared, wide-eyed with guilt and surprise, at me, his face suddenly darkening."Father!" he muttered._

"What do you think you're doing?" I demanded again, refusing to let him go.

"But - _Wahldrek - they attacked-"_

"They _panicked," I hissed at my pale-maned third-born."Which is exactly what you're doing!Snap out of it, boy!"_

The Hork-Bajir I'd pushed shoved one of its own that went to lunge at me, which earned it a glare until it shouted, "_Wrong!" and jabbed a finger at me."Good.Not know."_

The new Hork-Bajir stopped as well."Not know?Not know what wrong?"

"Not know not hurt.Not know friend."

"Friend?Flying monster from Father Deep friend?"

"Father, _he.Monster have no father but Father Deep.Not monster!"_

The second one looked up at me, squinting.It rubbed the back of one hand against one of its two horns."You, not monster of Father Deep?You Father?"

Things were quieting down.At the simple mention of "Father Deep" loud enough to be overheard, the battle fever was dying out."Father Deep", then "_Orba", echoed their way through the crowd.Stricken-looking Hork-Bajir were a strange contrast to the intermittent confused or panicked Bayetai sticking up from among them._

I shook my head, smiling, and let _Brenjuum go."No, we are not-"_

"From Mother Sky!" a Hork-Bajir shouted."Monsters like rain!Not of Father Deep!Monsters no fly!"

"Mother Sky no have monsters!" another called out.

"Not truth!Monsters of Father Deep, with _wings!" a third screamed._

"Monsters no fly!"One near the first agreed loudly with their companion.

"Not monsters," Sel Clemen finished for me, resting a shy hand on my lower arm.When I didn't flinch or respond in any way, the hand remained."No, then what?"It frowned, taking the hand away."You big.Too big.No monster look as Hork-Bajir, but you too big for Hork-BajirAnd wings - that wrong.And fur, like _chadoo - that wrong."It waved its hand along its head, as if to soften down a non-existent mane."And talon, wrong.."It poked a talon at my own."And... tail.Wrong."It bared its teeth a little."What, you?" it asked again, staring upward toward my face with its relatively useless eyes."You not Hork-Bajir.You __wrong.You of Mother Sky, or Father Deep, or... of Yeerk?"_

"We... we were of _orba," __Brenjuum said.He looked up at me, and I nodded once: let him explain it."Once, long ago.We're not of any of those things.We were of __orba."_

Another Hork-Bajir nodded in understanding."Not monster," it echoed in its overly simplistic way.It slapped its chest, then nudged the Hork-Bajir next to it."Monsters only of Father Deep.Not Yeerks - Yeerks only Gedd, and Hork-Bajir.Not monster-like non-monster."It nudged the Bayetajin to its other side, who looked down in a horrified shock that the creature would touch him."What name have you, tall one?"

"Get away from me!" the Bayetajin snarled, stepping away from the Hork-Bajir and raising his tailblade in a defensive manner.Bayetai know enough to give each other room for their wings and tailblades, but not so for Hork-Bajir - they crowded close together, leaving only room for elbows, knees, and the like.That was why, when the Bayetajin bumped into two other Hork-Bajir, who growled in annoyance but made no move against him, the Bayetajin was startled, and whirled around to face the obstacles.

I barely saw it, but it was unmistakable what happened next; one moment the Hork-Bajir who had figured out the connection between our people was trying to explain it to its companion and a small, infantile Hork-Bajir, and the next it had no head.The quarters were much, much too close for Bayetai to move too quickly, especially with their tailblades raised half-way.For a Bayetajin, it would have meant a scar across the stomach plates, but for a Hork-Bajir... it meant no head.

The Hork-Bajir's companion screamed, as did the others around them.A handful of Hork-Bajir jumped at the inadvertent killer, snarling, many screaming "Yeerk!"; a Bayetajin beside him went to his defense.I tried to be heard, to be understood, but it was of no use; there was no stopping the chaos now.One of the Hork-Bajir's own was dead.I knew better than I cared to admit that if it had been a Bayetajin to fall, it would have been no different.The only hope was to get to safety until things sorted themselves out.

The one called Sel Clemen seemed to have come to the same 

conclusion, but had no idea what to do about it.Turning to me, the odd, squat creature wore an expression that could only be described as grim."Go," it breathed."Only chance.Must go.No-monsters, no-Hork-Bajir must go."

My expression mirrored its own.I pushed _Brenjuum behind me."Find your brother and sisters," I snapped."Get them aboard.Now!"__Brenjuum hurried to obey.I then gripped Sel Clemen's arm."I am sorry," I said, not knowing what else could be done._

The Hork-Bajir nodded sadly."Know.Go."It gripped my arm as well.It was amazingly strong."Go, too.Help.Fly among Mother Sky's flowers with no-Yeerks.Find Andalite.Get help."

With that, it bounded on board my vessel with a pair of Bayetai trying to retreat.One tried to remove the Hork-Bajir, but I waved them off."Let them be!" I ordered them.Three Hork-Bajir leaped easily over my head onto the sides of the vessel, scrabbling for purchase, tearing at the skin.I leaped into the chaos, my eyes scanning around me in desperation.I completely ignored the various blades that cut into my thick skin.Where were they, where were they, where were....

"_Jirrell!Father!Help me!"_

The squeal could only be _Klindas, my __mrwiheiu daughter.But she was nowhere near me; I couldn't even catch a whiff of her scent."__Klindas!" I called out.A Hork-Bajir took a particularly vicious swipe at my neck, but at the same moment I tripped, and the creature came away with nothing more than a tuft of eight-foot-long gray hair.I twisted, trying to keep my balance, but all I ended up doing was smashing the side of my head against a rock, rather than breaking my jaw on it._

"_Klindas!" a voice similar to my own echoed.I stood, dazed, but still _

I saw out of the corner of my eye a flash of a familiar but unusually pale, brassy mane.A Hork-Bajir fell away from a young pink-maned female that was no taller than the average Hork-Bajir.With her wings folded as they were, I found myself without surprise that I had not been able to see _Klindas; of us all, she was the best concealed among us."Come on!"_

I was relieved beyond words as I waved for them to come back to the vessel, in spite of the awful ache in my head._"Fyvwiu!Here!" I shouted as loudly as I could.I saw __Vreren rush passed with __Lingrii tucked beneath her chest, her sides shielded with her wings, as she ran for the ship bent half-way over to provide __Lingrii the most protection possible.I saw __Brenjuum trying to force his way into a particularly tight knot of Hork-Bajir with no success, when two of them fell away, and a nearly-grown female with a mane of an oddly dark lavender color burst out.She grabbed hold of her brother's hand and began rushing him toward the ship.I hurried to intercept them."Good to see you're all right, __Sevelde," I said, forcing a dry tone into my voice._

"They hadn't a chance against me," _Sevelde replied grimly."I'm not _

the only female _trahdarhk to die like this."She gritted her teeth as a Hork-Bajir gauged her arm, but did not return the favor."I just hope __we have a chance against them."_

I could hardly come to terms with what was going on... Bayetai, being brought down by Hork-Bajir fighting like pack animals over an _accident!_

The three of us leapt over the body of a Bayetajin I didn't pause to identify.I could only imagine what was going on _my world... when these deaths were felt.... would they be felt, over such a distance?_

The Hork-Bajir had all quickly figured out that we were mostly trying to retreat, so they went after the ships with a renewed fury.The only word I heard from them now was the same one, over and over - the howling, hideous cry of "Yeerk!Yeerk!"I saw Sel Clemen on the boarding ramp of my ship, waving to any Hork-Bajir that would come.Three did.Another tried, but a Bayetajin grabbed it and tossed it back into the crowd as they leaped to safety, thinking only of themself.

Then, in front of me, a body I almost didn't see.It was small and bawling over the body of a Hork-Bajir who was trying desperately to hold the contents of its gut within itself.Looking up at the approaching trio of Bayetai with panicked eyes, the injured one hissed, swiping at me.The swift movement caused them to lose their grip, and entrails burst everywhere.The little one screamed in agony.The look on Sel Clemen's face needed no translation; I swept the _aatojuik up in one arm without breaking my stride for but an instant.Using a convenient rock as a ramp, I ran up it and leaped into the air, spreading my wings.__Sevelde, apprentice __mrwiheiu, was right behind me; __Brenjuum swiped at a Hork-Bajir, slicing off a limb, and knocked it down to get a clear path to the loading ramp._

My next realization stabbed into my soul, but I knew there was no choice."Start the sub-engines!" I shouted at a Bayetajin in the doorway.I recognized her as a fellow pilot.She was missing an arm from the elbow down and had a terrible gash all the way down the right side of her face, the eye being only a smear rather than an orb; she bled everywhere, making everything by the entranceway slippery.I landed just before the loading ramp so I wouldn't fall.

She blinked her remaining eye."But the others- the heat -"

I fought back the urge to scream in agony at my helplessness over the consequences."Do it!"

"We can't-"

"Do it!" I shouted again."Or we'll all die!"

The pilot staggered, shaking her head, then suddenly pitched forward 

without a sound._Brenjuum raced aboard, __Sevelde at his heels.I was having trouble with the __aatojuik, but not the Hork-Bajir, not anymore; one look at the struggling juvenile and rage boiled in their half-blind eyes, but they backed away rather than attacked.For that I was grateful as I leaped onto the boarding ramp.Shutting my eyes against the empty ache that filled me, I kicked the dead, or at least mortally wounded, pilot off the ramp and punched the control to shut the door just as a shadow passed over us all, and the ship was rocked by the unmistakable pounding of shipboard weaponsfire._

Now things had gone from bad to worse.

Now, not only would I have to deal with what I had to do, not only were the Hork-Bajir taking my vessel apart by the seams.Now not only did I have to appear completely in control when I was on the edge of exhaustion from multiple lacerations and a mildly severe concussion.But _now..._

Now, _someone was shooting at us._

# CHAPTER 5

The door hissed, then shut with a dull thud.Now there was no turning back; I had just sentenced most of my people to death.The ship rocked again from the weapons of the vessel I had not seen.

Needless to say, I wasn't in the best of moods.

Blood was like a carpet for a bodylength in each direction from the doorway, as if the ship itself were bleeding.In a way, it was, considering what I'd seen the Hork-Bajir doing to it.

Less than half our number, but more than a quarter, was squeezed aboard, at my best estimate.No less than twenty, no more than fifty.It was hard to tell, with two dozen or more Hork-Bajir squeezed in every corner, distracting me.I put the _aatojuik down, and it ran to a familiar-smelling figure."Sel Clemen," I sighed as I tried to bully my way to the pilot's station."How many are there?"_

The Hork-Bajir looked around."Know not," he said grimly."But not good."

"No," I agreed.

"_Jirrell!"__Vreren rushed to my side; her almost white, pink-tinted mane was slick with blood that didn't appear to be her own, her arms and legs were covered in scratches of various degrees, and her wings were slit and shredded in countless places, but __Lingrii, still held protectively in her arms, appeared unhurt."I'm glad you're all right."_

I rubbed my snout to hers briefly."Do we have a crew here?"

"We've mostly _trahdarhk," she said.She hugged __Lingrii even closer."__Malashii, what are we going to do?We can't leave the others here."_

"We can," I said darkly.I shoved even more viciously through the crowd toward my station."Get those engines on!" I shouted."They're dead, or as good as it," I told her as best I could, what with my soul and stomachs and throat rebelling at every opportunity."Can't you feel someone firing on us?We have to get out of here!" As if to punctuate my words, the ship shuddered yet again.

"You wouldn't leave _us behind," she snapped at me, teeth bared."I saw you go after __Sevelde and __Brenjuum.I noticed that __your family is here, __Jirrell!"_

"Not now, _Vreren," I muttered darkly in reply."We can grieve later."I nearly threw a two-horned Hork-Bajir sitting in the pilot's chair across the bridge.__Fyvwiu, looking paler than he had any right to but composed in spite of his multiple lacerations, slipped easily into the empty co-pilot's seat."All useless baggage off the bridge, now!" I snarled over the din.__Sevelde hurried up beside me, eyes flashing at the news of my order of mass murder, but saw my own expression left no room for anything but helping to alternately usher and bully the Hork-Bajir off the bridge."Get the medicals on the injuries," I muttered under my breath, not really caring if any heard me._

"You're making a mistake."

I glanced up to see _Lydyiuh, his left arm looking broken and his right knee almost fountaining blood, left horn broken in half and gray-tan mane half ripped out of his skull, glaring down at me.I had never seen a more welcome sight; I will never be able to put into words how glad I was to see that he'd gotten aboard."We can't leave those people behind," he said."The other ships are useless.The Hork-Bajir tore the third ship apart.The second has been destroyed by our attackers."_

"This one will be no better off if we don't get into the air," I snapped, knowing that any arguments I listened to would only change my mind, and I couldn't do that.No matter how badly it sat with me, no matter that this tragedy of errors would live with me forever - no matter how wrong this felt, I knew in my hearts as well as my head that there was absolutely no other way."We can't wait for them," I said quietly, punching in the priming sequence."I'm sorry, but if any of us are to get out of this alive, some are going to have to die."

"There has to be some other way!" _Lydyiuh cried, then snapped his mouth shut as the engines came on with a tell-tale hum.The Hork-Bajir in the open corridor fell silent.__Lydyiuh shuddered in horror, but said nothing.Suddenly he turned violently away, moving as far from me as he could without another word, his trail of blood mixing with that already shed.I didn't blame him._

I could barely stand the pain in my chest as I forced the vessel to lift off, in spite of damage the Hork-Bajir had done with their pitiful, but powerful, talons and hideous blades.I could barely force out of my mind the smell of charred meat that would not come through the air-tight seals of the carrier vessel - or, at least, what I hoped were _still air-tight seals, considering the Hork-Bajir had managed to slice the "tail" completely off, leaving us without the ability to fire back on our attackers - and the silent cries of Bayetai and Hork-Bajir alike that were incinerated as my vessel lifted off, with what I would later know to be thirty-three Bayetai and forty-six Hork-Bajir, half of the latter which had run for cover, three-quarters of which were more than willing to kill the Bayetai._

And the _aatojuik I'd saved?It hung onto Sel Clemen as if for dear life.Sel Clemen - a male, I later learned - looked drained."My poor, poor Nia," he murmured, over and over, holding the __aatojuik close."My poor, poor Nia."_

Thirty-three Bayetajin, battered and most badly injured: three doctors excluding _Lydyiuh, three engineers, seven pilots of which only I and __Fyvwiu were fully trained, fourteen __trahdarhk - in fact, all but two of those who had come - and four scientists of various fields, plus my little __Lingrii, totaling nineteen males, thirteen females, and one female __aatojuik: forty-six Hork-Bajir, totaling fourteen males, twenty females, and twelve __aatoju, six of each sex, none with any particular skills but getting in the way, although a few showed promise as aids to the few doctors we had, helping them where they could.Their stubby talons had more delicacy to them than they appeared to._

Never had a carrier vessel been so overcrowded or so crippled, much less with seventy-nine less compatible passengers, and lucky enough to actually escape whomever was attacking.We guessed that it was a Hork-Bajir vessel, protecting its people.(What fools we were.)Fortunately, we were able to ease things by sending out the pilots and any with any flight experience in the smaller, personal vessels, taking with them the worst injured.In that way, we lost all our medical crew, all the pilots but _Fyvwiu and myself, who were needed to pilot the warship, four traditional artist, and seventeen Hork-Bajir in twelve smaller ships.That left only fifty-seven passengers on the still over-crowded vessel that reeked ofthe blood that covered the floor so completely there were few places left to step without it.The remaining twenty-one Bayetai and thirty-four Hork-Bajir were forced to watch as the smaller vessels went into Z-space while we were forced to crawl along, too heavily damaged to attempt Z-space and therefore unable to even approach tunnel-space.Although things were already looking rather dire, my normal optimism had died with those I'd killed in ordering the ship to lift off; though it appeared that nothing more could go wrong, I had no doubt there was more to come.However, I kept this to myself._

That was why I was one of the few without surprise that, a year later, still limping home and not even half way there, we were intercepted.There was no where to run; the ship was huge, looking like a giant, three-legged bug, and bristling with weapons where we were almost dead in space and what weapons we had left would have been useless against something of that magnitude.

Twenty-one Bayetai and thirty-four Hork-Bajir were captured by a race of simian-like creatures that disgusted us all equally, and giant centipedeal ones that disgusted us even more.The aliens all spoke in a language that made no sense to us Bayetai and our translators, but it seemed that the Hork-Bajir knew of these races.

Sel Clemen was especially venomous."Yeerk!" he snarled.


	2. Chapters 6 through 11

# CHAPTER 6

"Yeerk!"

Two of the simians reached for Sel Clemen's arms, but he slashed with his elbows, effectively removing their hands."Yeerk!" he yelled again.

The Hork-Bajir were all panicking; that made us Bayetai more thanuneasy."What is it?" I demanded.

"Enemy!" a Hork-Bajir screamed."Yeerk!"

"Brain-stealers!" another shouted.

"Don't sound like a friendly folk," _Sevelde said, gritting her teeth.Her dark lavender mane fell over her shoulders as she jerked backwards, away from one of the giant insects."Get away!" she shouted, slashing upward with her longer, female talons.The creature ripped open from the three parallel gouges, spilling its organs everywhere."Ugh!" __Sevelde groaned in disgust."The stench of it!"_

The Hork-Bajir were slowly being captured, I saw, but one thing was 

obvious; these enemies didn't know what to do about Bayetai, we being bigger than the insects and the little simians combined.Gritting my teeth, I did something I'd never done before; reaching down, I unsheathed my hand-held Dracon shredder.Turning it to a low frequency, I fired off a shot at one of the simians.It let out a little yelp as it fell, but I couldn't tell if it was dead.Then I scorched one of the insects; it merely bruised."Setting fifteen for the apes!" I shouted."Thirteen for the bugs!"

_Sevelde grinned as she, too, pulled out a blaster."Go for the clean kill!" she added, taking down three apes and two bugs in rapid succession without bothering to check her power setting.__Fyvwiu pulled out his own blaster, but an ape leaped, grabbed it from his hand, and turned it on him.It, too, did not check the power setting._

It was setting four.

I screamed in sheer agony, completely oblivious to the fact that I really _had been injured from the peripheral wavebands of the blaster; I could hear five other cries join my own, but barely.I could feel the pain that I had not felt since my father had died, as a glass-maned and brittle-tailed old man; I could feel it burning through me, as if I had inhaled a lungful of Z-space emissions, as if I had swallowed fire; I could feel it leave me hollow and unable to focus.As if through eyes of someone else, I saw the others freeze, the Bayetai and Hork-Bajir and aliens in equal terror - the former from the obvious agony in our joined voices, the Hork-Bajir and others simply from the sound of it.I did not have to look beside me to the smoldering mass that was all that remained of my eldest; I did not have to see the anguish that blinded my daughters, mate, and remaining son; I did not __want to know._

_Fyvwiu._

The name that means "order".

"No...."I forced my thoughts into clarity, forced myself to open my eyes, forced the pain to channel itself into rage-filled energy."_No.__Fyvwiu."I bared my teeth, grabbing the mortally burned ape by the throat, still completely unaware of my own burns."That...was... my...__son!"I threw the creature as hard as I could, watching dispassionately as it hit the bulkhead with a cracking of a hundred bones all at once, and crumpled, formless, to the deck."That...was...my...__son!"I slashed with my elbow, decapitating the ape that stood there."My __son!"_

Then, before me, was _Klindas.I don't know, to this day, where she had come from; I had thought she had been put on one of the other, smaller vessels, and was safely on her way home.She wrapped her arms around me, burying her face in my stomach plates."Father!" she sobbed."Father, they killed him!They killed __Fyvwiu!"_

It was then that another creature stepped through the airlock.The remaining Hork-Bajir snapped out their trance, ready to attack, but stopped.

It was Sel Clemen.

He smiled a crooked smile, a smile I would not have thought fit the serious demeanor the Hork-Bajir had shown.

"No harm," he said.The _aatojuik, Nia, rushed to him, and he picked her up, nuzzling her snout with his own."No harm, mean.No fight.Safe."_

"Safe?" a Hork-Bajir asked, looking doubtful."Yeerk?"

Sel Clemen shook his head."No Yeerk.Safe.Only Gedd.Only Taxxon.No Yeerk."

"No Yeerk?" another Hork-Bajir asked, also sounding less than convinced."Gedd, no Yeerk?"

Sel Clemen shrugged."No Yeerk. No pool."

"What are you talking about?" a Bayetajin asked.

"Yeerks, _that's what they're talking about," another, a scientist by the name of __Gregruh, said."A race of parasitic worms that is able to take over the bodies of other creatures.Another race, known as Andalites, gave them the power of interplanetary travel, and from there they've been steadilytaking over the universe."__Gregruh snarled at Sel Clemen."How could there be Gedds without Yeerks?They're one in the same."_

Sel Clemen shook his head."No.Gedd free.Yeerk die.Kandrona broke.Pool gone.No Yeerk now."

"_Now," a __trahdarhk echoed, nodding."Oh."Obviously, they had no clue what the Hork-Bajir was talking about, but had enough energy left for sarcasm.It seemed lost on the Hork-Bajir, however, who nodded quite seriously at Sel Clemen's assurances._

"Go."Sel Clemen looked around, then met _my gaze as best he could."Z-space good.Go home, you."_

I frowned at that, but looked down at _Klindas, bawling uncontrollably, still wrapped around my waist.I looked around myself; the Hork-Bajir had been let go by their captors, while the Bayetai all looked unhealthily exhausted.__Sevelde was shaking; __Brenjuum looked faint, and his jaw was clamped shut; __Vreren was nearly as pale as her hair; __Lingrii was howling louder than __Klindas.I suddenly became aware of the fact that some of my skin had been burned off by the closeness of the setting-four blast; my left arm throbbed mind-numbingly.I heaved a shuddering sigh."Fine," I muttered, defeated."Fine."_

Sel Clemen smiled crookedly again, and walked out of the ship followed closely by two simians.Many of the Hork-Bajir followed, but some still looked worried.The Bayetai were all staring at me.

Although she was almost full-grown - or as grown as she would ever be, although she was truly no larger than a Hork-Bajir and not half as solid - I swept _Klindas up in my arms.I sighed again, trying without success to get my breathing right.I closed my eyes, forcing the pain to recede. Right now, I had more to deal with.__Fyvwiu would be mourned.But not now.__Those that are alive must come before those that are dead.That is a Bayetajin saying I always felt was hollow, but never as hollow as it was then."Let's go," I murmured, and followed the Hork-Bajir out.The others followed me._

As I stepped through the airlock, there was a flash of light, an immense pain, and.... nothing.

# CHAPTER 7

I awoke to pain.

"I am sorry about your daughters, _Jirrell."_

I was shaking; I couldn't focus my mind on anything.I couldn't even push myself out of my reclining position; my arms refused to cooperate.My lungs barely remembered how to breathe.

"I'm afraid your youngers were too fragile for the measures necessary to stun the rest of you all at once; the older.... let me only say that she was... uncooperative."

It took a great deal of effort to focus my eyes.To my right, nothing; to my left, light that was much too bright.Of course - my right eye saw the floor, the left the ceiling.I willed my arms to obey me, but they refused to.I felt impossibly hollow, from my skull to my toe-talons to my tail-tip, as if someone had just taken a talon and dug everything out of me.My wings and left arm were absolutely numb.

"They say you're a pilot and an engineer, _Jirrell.And that you're in charge.They respect you very much."_

I was starting to regain feeling in my right arm; I managed to move both arms into a position to push myself up, but that drained me of what energy I had.I stayed that way, panting with the sheer anguish that tore at every part of my being.

"Oh, don't tire yourself needlessly.Strange how you feel the deaths of your blood relatives.Is it the same for mates, I wonder?"

Terror lent me strength; I pushed myself so hard that I was standing before I realized it.I set my weight on my tail blade, using it as a third leg.The universe spun around me, but still I was able to see the horror.

Sel Clemen wore a smile I thought only befitted a _seenifteki, one of many beasts on my planet that ate __aatoju; behind him, __Vreren hung by her broken arms on a single chain, her body shuddering, her shredded wings on the ground beneath her feet rather than on her back, and on another chain, __Lingrii hung by her broken neck, her young eyes staring forever in terror."__Vreren..." I whispered._

She looked up; pale green eyes that had for so many years brought pride and love welling up within me, in spite of our plentiful differences, now only knew pain.She was blinder than the Hork-Bajir; she couldn't see past her pain."_Malashii....?"She breathed raggedly; her lungs were punctured, she had to have extensive internal bleeding.My mate was dying, she deserved a healing valley, comfort, painkillers, sedatives...._

Not this.Not this!What was happening?No!What was going on?!

"_Vreren!"It was unreal.This couldn't be __Vreren, not my __Vreren!No, it was a trick!_

"_Malashii.... __Jirrell...."Her broken body shook with a heaving sob."__Malashii.... __jur nrok trell... prok... prok dreel'l."She shuddered again, then howled out in agony."__Jur prok dreel'l aatoju!!"_

_Mate...Jirrell...mate... they killed them... murder... murdered ours.They murdered our children!_

"No!"I lunged forward, snarling, only to find the pain renewed and quadrupled.I backed away quickly, seething.A force field!Of course - they had put me in a force field.This enemy was smarter than the Hork-Bajir.Smarter, perhaps, than Bayetai, but that remained to be seen.

Still, something within me kept telling me, _It isn't real.__It isn't real._

_Shut up, I told that thing.__Stop trying to mislead me!My people have no word for "lie" or "lying"._

Sel Clemen smiled even more and shook his head."Pity - I thought you - 'Bayetai', wasn't it - might be less primitive than these Hork-Bajir have proven to be.Relatives of yours, aren't they?"His smile turned more chilling."Where have you been hiding, you beautiful beast, you?"

I bared my teeth. "We don't need to hide from the likes of you."

Sel Clemen shook his head, making a sound of disappointment."Don't toy with us, _Jirrell, or we'll toy with you."He nodded to the simians, and one pulled out something dark and rather short, an almost semi-circular piece of what looked like bone.He slashed __Vreren across the snout; she didn't cry out even as blood gushed from the wound.Sel Clemen turned back to me and raised one eye ridge."This host has no idea where you are from, but your DNA matches the Hork-Bajir too closely; you're from the same planet, and the same ancestor race.I ask again - where are the rest of you?"_

I set my jaw, slowly understanding what was being asked of me.The mass murder was nothing; this was my true punishment."I can't tell you."

"A pity."He nodded to the simians again, and this time the slash was below the knee.The severed appendage fell on top of the already severed wings.Again, _Vreren was silent."This can go on for quite some time, friend.And we've still the younger boy to go."_

"Why?" I snarled.

Sel Clemen - who wasn't Sel Clemen; it couldn't be - shrugged."Well, the younger girls were accidents.They were both unsalvageable from when we stunned them.It seems you Bayetai are less resilient to Dracon beams than Hork-Bajir.The elder girl proved too... uncooperative to even attempt interrogation, so we tried to simply infest her, along with a few other, equally vicious ones..."Sel Clemen shook his head and grimaced, then offered me an empty, cold smile."It seems you Bayetai don't accept infestation very well.Your elder daughter was quite resilient, you might be proud to know.The others died along with their Yeerks.It took three before she was too brain-dead to fight anymore.We put her out of her misery for you."

_Sevelde... Klindas...I looked up blindly.__Fyvwiu...My eyes settled on the small corpse that hung from its snapped neck.__Lingrii....They then shifted to the almost-corpse that hung beside it.__Vreren....I shuddered, lowering my head.Though it tore me apart, I knew what had to be done.What was the only way.__The good of the many... I thought, my hearts aching at the unfinished rule that had to lead me here._

_The good of the many outweighs the good of the one.__The live must come before the dead.__He who uses evil to save is worth more than he who allows what is right to lead to death.__Some evil is necessary for the existence of good.__To mislead others may be necessary to be true to one's self.The old laws came to me, lending me no strength, only more pain, more weight on my sunken shoulders._

_From the same planet?I sighed shakily, my course clear even though every grain of me warred against it.Bayetai - and, as it turned out, Hork-Bajir as well - do not have a word for "lie".It is against our nature to lie.True, we sometimes mislead each other for jest or surprises, but not in a way to hurt others.Not in a way that puts others in danger.Not to outright __lie."We're all that's left," I whispered."Us and those that were on the smaller vessels.The Hork-Bajir hated us because we were smarter and larger and in all ways superior.They killed us off, ate us and our young.So we had to leave."_

"Arrogant as an Andalite!" the creature laughed."And you wished to take some Hork-Bajir with you?After all they'd done?" Sel Clemen asked sarcastically.

I nodded.Anything, anything to spare _Vreren and __Brenjuum and the homeworld."There were... too few of us.We thought... there might be a way... to cross-breed... save what was left of us."_

A dark look settled on Sel Clemen's face, and my hearts stopped.

This... this creature... could it be that it... it _believed this?Did it think that even desperation wasn't enough for a naturally honest creature to lie for? Perhaps Hork-Bajir were too simple to even know it was possible to speak something untrue, and this... this creature... thought we were far more alike than I believed us to be."You couldn't have without genetic equipment," he said."Surely you already knew that."_

"It was on the third ship," I told him.I didn't care if I was caught lying, or if what truths I said - such as the existence of the equipment - proved my undoing; I only had to keep everyone else safe, especially _Vreren and __Brenjuum.That was all that mattered.If I lost them, there was no way I could hold on; if I failed my world.... well, then there'd be even bigger troubles to attend to.I couldn't hang on, if I was all that was left."Not mine.Not the first."_

Sel Clemen sort of sighed then."My name is Visser Sixty-eight, _Jirrell," he said."Sixty-eighth Visser of the Yeerk Empire.I've need of a pilot of your reputed skill.And your vessel, though damaged, seems most... curious.And exquisite, given certain... improvements."_

"I'm glad you like it," I snapped.

Sel Clemen shook his head, smiling an unpleasant, chilling smile."Oh, we can't have that, now can we?We can't have you talking back to me like that, _Jirrell.You and your Bayetai can't be made into Controllers, it seems, but I think we've better ways to deal with you."With that, he jerked his hand._

The simian slashed; it was not a wing or limb that fell this time, but a pale pink-maned head.The other ape lowered the force field that had shocked me, keeping Visser Sixty-Eight safe from harm, and the first threw the dark thing in with me; the second put the force field back up.

There was no pain this time; I and _Vreren had no blood relation.But as I stared numbly, there was nothing to feel; my hearts were gone.My hearts and everything that made me myself with them._

Sel Clemen smiled again."I'll give you a standard hour to grieve."He tapped his chest and grinned an ironic grin I longed to slash from his head."I'm not without hearts."He chuckled before his expression turned dark."Make sure he doesn't use what remains of that bastard daughter of his to kill himself.He's much too much of use to us alive.And clean up that mess."He then exited quickly.

I bent down, picking up the dark thing.It was a bone, still warm from the body it had come from.A finger talon, broken short so to be only a few inches from the knuckle.I didn't need to sniff it to know whose scent it would carry thanks to Visser Sixty-Eight's statement.I closed my eyes, and felt the pain renew.

_Sevelde...._

It was unbearable, the pain.

_Fyvwiu... __Klindas... __Lingrii... __Sevelde... __Vreren._

I shuddered, then stopped breathing; my hearts slowed and, one by one, shut off.

And still I stood, balanced on my feet and tail, open and staring eyes mirroring the hollowness that was within.

_Jirrell... the dead one._

I considered keeping my hearts still.Letting my lungs atrophy.There would be nothing the Yeerks could do; I'd be brain dead in less than an hour.Useless.

But still, I closed, then opened, my eyes; my breathing began again; my hearts began tobeat once more.

There was still _Brenjuum.I could not leave him alone in the universe.He was only a boy.He needed someone._

How stupid I was, then.Whoever I was.

After all, _Jirrell was dead._

All those without hope are as good as dead.

CHAPTER 8

It took me two standard years to learn a good, working form of _Galard, the standard language the Gedds and Taxxons had spoken in; it took me only a fraction of one to figure out the controls of the mothership.The primitiveness of them was an insult to my expertise: there was nothing even remotely resembling slipdrive, or even approaching anything that could enable them to reach it - therefore, I never bothered mentioning its existence.The Visser kept Sel Clemen as a host until he didn't need to use the language I understood, then returned to a strange host that looked somewhat like an thirty-armed, bluish-skinned octopus with three globular eyes and two mouths, feeling very accomplished to have earned a rank of Sixty-two.I'd been allowed to see __Brenjuum, a hollow-eyed smaller version of myself with a mane of brassy gray.The words we'd traded were brief and emotionless.Then __Brenjuum was gone; although I'd see another of our small party once or twice, either Hork-Bajir or Bayetai, I never saw __Brenjuum again.I wish I had not seen him in the first place._

The years passed monotonously, how many I never bothered to count.I learned of more races than I ever had wanted to know - Andalites, Bre'Tak, Corrts, Kondrots, Jyruu, Leerians, Humans... - of which I came to see too many.The humans were new, though.Tiny creatures of about a third my size with a surprisingly similar, bi-symmetrical build as Bayetai had, but tailless, wingless, and utterly without any form of natural protection - no horns, no talons, no fangs, _nothing.I wondered blandly how any race could evolveinto the dominant species without any natural weapons.I learned from a Human-Controller that it was because humankind was the only race on their planet to use constructed tools and develop the slightest bit of acknowledgeable sentience.That didn't sound very fair, but then, I was all too familiar with how fair life really was.After all, my daughters were never allowed to grow up.__Lingrii would have been so pretty.... and __Klindas had always been so sweet... and darling __Sevelde, second-born but so much closer to my heart than __Fyvwiu had been... and steadfast __Fyvwiu himself... and beloved, oh-so-brilliant and beloved __Vreren....._

As always, I forced the thoughts from my mind.I had been taken off the bridge in the middle of my shift by direct order of the Visser.I turned into the medical bay, to be confronted by the abomination that was all tentacles and rounded head and giant, globby eyes and fanged, slobbery mouths."Visser," I greeted it.

The mouths turned upward."Greetings, pilot.Good of you to be so prompt.You've served me well these years, and I thought I might reward you."

I frowned."I want for nothing."

The Visser waved a tentacle at that."Oh, rubbish.You want for so much.You want for your past, but at least you've been smart enough to put it behind you.You want for your family as well, and, alas, that cannot be returned to you."Two tentacles bent toward the balloon-like head."Then again...."

A door opened, and behind it stood - barely - a Hork-Bajir female.She raised her head painfully, and her eyes widened."_Grift!" she gasped, pulling back into her little hidden alcove.Her claws and blades were gone; her horns had been rubbed to near-nothingness.One knee was askew, both elbows fused, and there was a pair of kinks in her spikeless tail."Bayet," she growled low in her throat.My nostrils flared a little; she was of the original group.I almost smiled; it was the one I'd thrown out of my chair, in that past life.The irony tasted bitter in my mouth, but not poisonous.It was a pleasant thing to think of, rather than to dwell on, the past reality._

The Visser chuckled."_Jirrell, I'd like you to meet your new mate."_

I did not speak right away.Instead I glared at the Visser."What is the point to this, Visser?"

"Point?Very direct, _Jirrell.Of course, you've never been one to waste time."The two mouths grinned."The point is, I have my orders.And they might interest you.The fact is, that I am to figure out the secret to your __orba."_

I stiffened."What?"

The Visser chuckled."It's quite simple, really.Your race, our Controllers have found, believe that you descended from a race called the _orba.Fascinating myth, really.But it seems that the Council of Thirteen want to find how much truth is in it.And they've come up with a compromise among themselves - we combine the DNA of a Bayetajin and a Hork-Bajir two hundred times, two hundred random combinations.We see what viable embryos we get from it.And we see, from there, what we get from __them."_

My eyes narrowed."You're forgetting something, Visser."I glanced at the half-forgotten broken Hork-Bajir, who glared spitefully back, before returning my gaze to the Visser."Hork-Bajir and Bayetai are sub-species.Incompatible."

"Oh, hardly.You don't understand, _Jirrell - this is already done.Congratulations, __Jirrell."The Visser waved a tentacle at an opaque cylinder that rested on one of the tables.It was about two feet high and half one in diameter."You're about to become a father."I inhaled sharply as the cylinder began to rise, fluids spilling from beneath it into a drain built into the table."This is only the first viable combination we've come upon, of course.Number twenty-three.Perhaps you can come up with a better name?"_

There were groans from the medical scientists looking on; the creature that hid beneath the canister had three toes per foot and talons.Its skin was almost black in color, but as I watched, its thick stomach plates were revealed; its tail ended in a long, skinless blade; it bore wings on its wide shoulders; its hands held two fingers and a thumb; its head bore four horns of appropriate length; its skull was plastered with thick strands of grayish hair.Only its skin color, an almost black-green, and its eye color, a cloudy, almost bluish green, gave away that this thing... this _aatojuik... was not Bayetai._

This _aatojuik... this child... was mine._

The Visser made a sound of disgust, then swore."Oh, kill it.It's not what we need."

The little thing looked about, and its strange gaze fell on the Hork-Bajir.She made a cooing sound, entranced by the little _aatojuik, but the thing made no sound in return as it wobbled on its oversized feet, then fell over with a thud.Instead it turned its gaze on its sire... on me... and slowly... uncertainly... it smiled._

"No."

The Visser looked at me in surprise."You dare-"

"It _might make a good Controller, Visser."I inwardly shuddered at my own words."You've told me how much more useful Bayetai would be if they could be made into Controllers.Here's a very good chance to try it.Even if you don't, he doesn't know what you are - he's yours, no matter what you do to him."With that I turned my back to the __aatojuik."And name him whatever you will.It matters not to me."_

"Hmm."I could feel the Visser's smiles."Him, you say?A son?Perhaps it is its scent - my sense of it isn't all too well - but I must say, I do 

not know how you know it is male, _Jirrell."_

I glared behind myself."We tend to know our own," I replied sharply."Do with it what you want.It matters not to me."I walked out the door, not stopping until I turned the first corner on my way back to the bridge.I then leaned against the wall, shuddering.

_Arctesch._

The name echoed through my head, chilling me to my marrow._Arctesch._

_Traitor._

"_Jirrell?"_

The name was spoken in a whisper; I glanced over my shoulder, and was shocked, speechless, to see a familiar face.My voice was shaking as I whispered, "_Lydyiuh?"_

"We all look alike to them, don't we?"The limping doctor smiled grimly.His knee was fused; his horn still broken; his mane, though glassier, still long and thick, if not more so than the last time I'd seen him, but noticeably shorter in many places; his arm set but the elbow slightly askew.He was the most beautiful mirage I'd ever seen."No one's even questioned my being here.How fare you, dearest?"He touched my arm gently, and I jerked in surprise.

_He was real._

"Get out of here."

_Lydyiuh's smile eased into something more sincere."I must say, it is good to see you alive."_

"You don't understand.You have to go.Now!"

He seemed oblivious to my vicious, snarling tone."_Jirrell, some of us managed to get home and went to return, but the Hork-Bajir refused to cooperate.We found the z-space trail of this monstrosity and my ship followed it.Listen to me - we're coming for you."_

"No.You can't."

"We can't leave you here!"

"_Lydyiuh!"The other Bayetajin's mouth snapped shut at the snarl _

that was my voice."You will leave, now.Don't wait for any others you took with you.You will leave, and tell any following you that we are all dead.Is that clear?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Leave!" I hissed."We are dead, or as good as it!"

"But your deaths-"

"Blame it on the distance, anything, but we are dead!"I slashed the air before me, barely missing _Lydyiuh's throat."We have nothing now!Haven't you seen any of the others, __Lydyiuh?"I shuddered."I'm the only one left with wings!Most of us don't have a single talon left, much less souls!If I weren't in such a shock right now... it's taking everything I have _

not to turn on you!"

"_Jirrell, we need you."_

"What you need is to get your miserable corpse out of this Hell, _Lydyiuh.We are __dead."I turned away."__Lydyiuh, they've killed them.Everyone but __Brenjuum.They need him to keep me sane so I can fly this miserable armageddon from one end of the forsaken universe to another.All that's left of us are whatever they... the Yeerks... haven't cut off.That's how they keep us in line - they tear us apart, piece by piece.First any relations we have, then they go after us.__Lydyiuh... they've killed __Sevelde."_

"_Sevelde is dead?"__Lydyiuh had always had the utmost respect for the short-tempered young female traditional artist with the dark lavender mane, more than nearly anyone else.For her part, __Sevelde had always looked to him as an unrelated uncle.Even __Lydyiuh's mate, grim as she was, had ungrudgingly liked her."How could they kill __Sevelde?"_

"They killed her mind, trying to take it over.From there, she was useless to them, so they killed her husk."

"Not _Sevelde...."_

"No, not _just Sevelde.They've killed us all, __Lydyiuh.Now get out of here."_

"I'm not leaving you to this."

"Get out!" I howled.Then, lowering my voice, I grabbed the Bayetajin and shook him until his neck was ready to snap."I can't go.Grab any you can when you leave, but I can't go, _Lydyiuh.You don't understand...."A violent tremor ran through me."The ship.You have to destroy the ship."But even as I said it, I knew it was stupidity.There was no way it could be done with the entire fleet of Bayetai warships, much less a single small vessel._

"What?"_Lydyiuh shook his head."I can't do that!"_

"You have to.You don't understand...."My jaw trembled so violently, it was near impossible to speak; I knew my old friend couldn't do what I asked.He could only return with the horror only I, _Jirrell, could tell him."__Lydyiuh, they're trying to make __orba."_

"What are you talking about?"

"I have another son now, friend."The color drained from _Lydyiuh's _

face."They... they combined my DNA with that of a Hork-Bajir.They will, two hundred times... they want an _orba out of it, but so far all they have is a nearly-black Bayetajin that I don't know what they're going to do with.His name... it's __Arctesch."_

_Lydyiuh bared his teeth."Traitor?"_

I nodded."_Arctesch," I affirmed."Who knows what they'll get if it continues?You have to go, friend.Find who you can and leave.But..."I shuddered again."As long as they have __Brenjuum, and now __Arctesch... I can't go."_

"I understand, _Jirrell."__Lydyiuh gripped my arm."But understand - we will be back."A dark look crossed his face."__Some of us can't kill our own."_

"You can't kill us," I snarled in response."We're already dead.Is that clear?Now get out of here, and listen to me - please - _do not come back.They've modified our own weapons for their use.They'd have no effect on their ships.You'd be coming in for a massacre.Save yourself, __Lydyiuh, and any you can, destroy the ship if you can.But go."_

"You'll not be forgotten, friend."

"I won't forget you if I can help it, dearest."I tried to smile, but my 

mouth refused to reach anything more than a grimace, if that."Go."

_Lydyiuh nodded."Four __shek are remaining behind," he whispered."They were all that came with me, besides our pilot, still on the ship.You have no say in that.We had already agreed on that, back home.Good luck, dearest.May we meet again, someday."With that, he turned and limped off down the corridor, not looking back._

I waited until he disappeared from view, and headed back for the bridge.

To this day, I can only hope he escaped.Like _Brenjuum, I never saw him again._

But, unlike _Brenjuum, I never heard anything of him again either...._

# CHAPTER 9

_Arctesch grew less quickly than I expected, or perhaps the yearspassed slower than I gave them credit; either way, when the next embryo, number forty-four, came to term, he was still considered too young to join me in overseeing its "birth", but I really didn't care.To keep me in line, Visser Sixty-Two had chosen a very effective, if unreasonably cruel, way of doing it - I was in charge of overseeing the "birth" of each viable embryo.Under their supervision, of course - as a pilot, such matters were not deemed as part of my "expertise"._

"Forty-four", as far as I knew it, was female.I sighed, more out of sadness than anything else; nothing could compare to _Sevelde."Begin," I said._

The canister began to raise; there were moans as the two-toed feet were revealed.What was strange about the very Hork-Bajir feet, however, was their pale green color, paler even than my own.As more of the body was revealed, it showed no tail blade, no stomach plates, two horns on her head like a Hork-Bajir female, three fingers and a thumb, and small, curved talons everywhere.The blades at the joints were correct; only the pale color of her skin and pale, greenish-blue eyes, almost indistinguishable from her skin but for their blue tone, and fragile build, like I had never seen in a Hork-Bajir, showed her to be peculiar.

_Showed._

_Nrintai, that's what I knew her to be.__Gentle talon.My expression softened at the sight of the fragile-looking Hork-Bajir, whose name was just another word for __mother._

"A pale Hork-Bajir," the Visser sneered."And a weak-looking one at that."

"The first seems to be proving himself rather well," I pointed out in as bored a voice as I could manage."Perhaps this one will be of some use."

"Looks like a breeder to me," one of the doctors muttered to another.I ignored the comment.

"If you insist, _Jirrell," the Visser said, shrugging many of its shoulders as if it didn't matter."Oh, before you go, I thought you might want to know - embryo sixty-eight is ready in the next room."_

"And seventy-three in a year or so," one of the doctors said."The Council wants us spreading them out for now, because of the strange disunities.Until we start getting things that actually _look like cross-breeds, we're in no rush."_

"Very well," I said, sounding disinterested, but my gaze stayed on the little creature before me._Nrintai, I thought with an inward smile.She looked up with near-blind eyes and smiled the blank smile of a newborn, giving it to any that would look.The Visser made a sound of disgust and started toward the next room.I followed."Proceed," I said as I entered the room._

The new set of doctors began, the canister rising slowly.I was too busy listening for a name that it took the horrified gasps of the others to bring me about.I roared in disgust.

Whatever it was, it was black as tar with wings twice the size of its limp body.Toes with enormous talons raked up its feet, in a vertical rather than horizontal row.It had three legs, with bones that might have been blades jutting out of each joint, but that it had no joints to speak of, only limp places where the bones should have been.Its insanely long neck was twisted in the most grotesque manner.Its eyes were dead white, its pupils gray, and oversized, its horns jagged like Bayetai blades and ringing its head; there must have been twenty of them.It had its extra leg in place of its right arm; the left was all thumbs rather than fingers, with talons longer than the length of its body.Its tail looked almost like a comb, with a double row of spines raking from it, and ending in a thin tail blade.It had no snout at all, just a gash across its face.

"Kill it!" the Visser screamed.

I shook my head."You can't."

The Visser glared at me, outraged."It's an abomination!"

"It's already _dead," I snarled in return."You can't kill a corpse, Visser.At least, not so far as I've seen.Even you Yeerks haven't discovered a way to do __that yet."I left the room, too disgusted by the sight of the creature to ever go back into that room again - at least, not until I was forced to.I ignored the horrible sound of a name that echoed in my head like a dying wail.__Seen'tife'ck.__Unnatural._

Literally, "helpless abomination".

I swore something then.I swore that, whenever "seventy-three" was begun, I would find out and I would kill it.I wouldn't let there be any more abominations.

I of course knew how useless swearing anything was.What I didn't know, however, was that I was too late... that a worse abomination already existed....

# CHAPTER 10

The doctor must have been psychic; _Nrintai was too weak to become a soldier like a normal Hork-Bajir.Her hearts weren't in it.She was made a breeder quite early.But that was still awhile in my future._

Needless to say, I couldn't keep my promise to myself about "seventy- three".Too soon I found myself back in place over a canister."Proceed," I said."It had better not be another abomination, or someone will pay for it."

"It's alive, at least, Grer 072," one of the doctors, a Bre'Tak, assured me.It was a little curious to see that all four of the doctors were Bre'Tak this time around."Other than that, I can't tell you much.Not even the sex of the little beast."

The canister started to rise; there were groans at the sight of a pair of medium-green feet with three toes, like a Hork-Bajir with the skin of a Bayetajin who had spent too much time in the sun."Quiet!" I snapped, annoyed."Act a _little less like __aatoju and more like grown beasts!"The Visser chuckled.The canister continued its journey; long, thin legs revealed semi-short pairs of jagged blades at the knees, like Hork-Bajir ones, but chipped.I frowned; there was no tail yet, and no wings.Where were they?_

There was a scraping sound, and the tail fell from where it had gotten wedged between the canister and the _aatojuik.My eyes widened._

The blade on the end of the tail was incredibly long, at least half as long as the tail itself, which was without sharp, Hork-Bajir spines.However, it wasn't like a Bayetajin tailblade; for one thing, it was not correctly proportioned, being ridiculously long.For another, it had a thorn-like growth that was so sharp it glittered, like a Hork-Bajir spine had fused into the tail blade.

The hands were revealed, and my expression darkened even farther; there were two fingers and a thumb, like a Bayetajin, even though their feet were like those of a Hork-Bajir.Then I noticed that what I had mistook for ankle blades were opposable, like my own third toes.And the talons.... they were long, though not as long as a Bayetajin would have, and curved, but not nearly as curved as a Hork-Bajir's.The creature had stomach plates that looked of the usual sort, but yellower than the normal tawny color.The ones that should have extended down the tail thinned to nothing more than discolored skin.The body was delicately thin, not like _Nrintai but like a Bayetajin, until the canister reached the shoulders, which were surprisingly wide.Spines like that of a Bayetajin extended down its back, but they, like the blades I realized were under-serrated, not chipped, that appeared at the knees and elbows, were too long; they shrunk until they ended just before the base of the tail.Smaller blades raked from the wrists; the wrist ones looked like afterthoughts.The neck was as long and graceful as either race could hope for; the head-_

The snout was vaguely beak-like, but not nearly as so as a Hork-Bajir's, with the length of a Bayetajin but a lot of the Hork-Bajir curve, giving the creature a very concentrated, cunning look thanks to its yellow-tinted snout.It had three horns, but not like a Hork-Bajir male - one was in the correct place for a Hork-Bajir's foremost horn, but it turned backward, with a split on the end like that of a Bayetajin midridge, with two others over its ear-holes, like a Bayetajin's side pair but a little too straight and far, far too short.And between the horns-

A mane.A mane that was too short, one that would be forever stunted.One that would never be what a Bayetajin should have.One that would never hold the gentle, pale color natural to a Bayetajin.

A mane that was the brilliant red of human blood.

"What _is it?" I whispered, too awedto say anything else._

All I could think it was... was... was _beautiful.The Bayetai word for it would have been __Aetaialaine.__Beyond imagine.It did not matter that I could hear no name from it - that was my name for it.__Aetaialaine._

It stumbled a little on its slim, bird-like feet, but managed to remain standing, which was as much a shock as the strange creature itself; _aatoju can sometimes stand for a few moments at birth, but never for extended periods of time - not for a couple days, at the very least.For balance it flared... its wings.Or what little wings it had.They were tiny, at least as stunted as the mane, without a doubt a lot more so.They were ridiculous, in the opposite way as the cruel-looking tail blade - they were useless flaps of skin, nothing more._

"Kill that.... _creature," the Visser snarled."What __is that thing?"_

"An _othyb," one of the doctors said, baring its teeth in disgust."__Look at that thing!"_

The... _thing...the __Aetaialaine... glared around it with yellow eyes that held the faintest hint of green.It wasn't as blind as a Hork-Bajir, from the focused way it looked around, but it didn't appear able to focus on much of anything in particular with its odd, green-tinted gold eyes, which greatly resembled, I realized with a sharp pain in each of my hearts, the ones that helped to make __Sevelde so beautiful.Like the other __aatoju it looked at me, knowing by my scent what I was.It didn't smile like the others.Instead, I jerked as it __spoke._

«_Jrikvelh,» it said in a voice that resembled the cooing sound __Lingrii made when she awoke, a gentle, semi-feminine sound that wasn't a sound at all; it couldn't be, since I seemed to be the only one who heard it.Never had the names of the others been spoken to me in this way; I hadn't even __heard a name from this one; it was too strange.«__Jirrell?__Jrikvelh.»It looked around, its scarlet mane plastered to its skull as it stumbled around on its oversized feet, trying to stay upright, as if walking on stilts.It rested its enormous tail blade on the tabletop, and stopped stumbling, supported by its weight._

I felt as if my hearts had been torn from me, my empty hearts that beat to keep an empty husk functioning.

_Jrikvelh.Not __Aetaialaine, but __Jrikvelh._

A word I had nearly forgotten, because after all the years as the heartless creature I had become, the Yeerkless Controller I passed my corpse as being, it had become nothing more than a cruel memory._Jrikvelh; the thing I had lost between __Vreren's death and meeting the empty shell that remained of my __Brenjuum._

_Jrikvelh._

_Hope._

There was only one way the little thing could know that word at birth.

"Belay that," I said calmly."Bring it to its mother, like the others."

The Visser glared at me."That _othyb is nothing," it snarled."What use could it be?"_

"It's closer than we've been so far," I snapped in reply."Look at it!Three horns of the correct formation, small wings, thin tail, the facial shape."

"That... _thing... is worthless.Too much is wrong to outweigh what is right."The Visser regarded the creature with the most extreme disgust."Kill that thing before it can kill itself."_

"No."The Visser turned its glare on me, but I was beyond flinching._Jrikvelh.__Hope.After all those years, I could not allow hope to die again."What it lacks in __orba traits it more than makes up for in the best traits of Hork-Bajir and Bayetai... but for its wings.Besides, open your eyes - it's still standing.Whatever it is, it's stronger than the others.Stronger, even, than a Bayetajin.Anything so strong at birth is not to be destroyed simply because it isn't pretty.Such strength should be harnessed, encouraged."_

The Visser glowered at the creature, but there was something I had learned long ago - this silly slug was desperate for promotion.It believed nearly anything it was told, to save itself the trouble of sorting anything out.Of course, anyone suspected of giving it misinformation was immediately executed."Very well, if that is your belief.If it fails me, then I'll just throw it in the incinerator as punishment.Perhaps you should keep your foolish soft-heartedness to yourself, _Jirrell - it would have been nicer to simply put it out of its misery here and now."A tentacle waved to the doctors."Remove those flaps of skin it tries to pass off as wings.They'll never function.Then get it out of my sight."_

A Bre'Tak approached the little thing, looking revolted.The tiny hybrid looked to me with _Sevelde's eyes, and I felt... a brushing at my mind.«__Jirrell?» the little thing asked me in its faintly feminine voice-that-wasn't-a-voice.A look of confusion appeared on its intelligent face._

_I'm sorry, I thought.__I can't save you._

«Save?No?_Jirrell?»The creature looked at the approaching Bre'Tak, its pupils visibly focusing on the alien.«No?»Then it bared its tiny, soft teeth.«No!»The Bre'Tak reached for it, laser in hand, when the little thing suddenly spun around.«No!»_

In less than a heart cycle, it was over; the creature, without a sound, fell on all fours as it completed its rotation, its fragile balance gone; the tail blade, so sharp it was utterly clean in spite of its first use, banged against the tabletop loud enough to vibrate the walls.But it wasn't over for the little thing; it was over for the surgeon.

He looked at his handless wrist at the end of his arm, then his finger-less hand on the table, then his fingers, still wrapped around the laser, on the floor, before starting to scream.I felt a surge of pride in the little thing; it had known, _instinctively, how to use its queer tail blade, as much as any Bayetai __aatojuik does, even though it wasn't really the same.In a single move it had sealed the fate of a full-grown Bre'Tak._

"Kill him!" the Visser shouted over the cries of the others."A handless surgeon is as useless as a headless host.Restrain that thing, _then sever its wings!"The Visser's voice turned cold."Come with me, Grer 072."I followed the oozing creature from the room, forcing my eyes away from the sight of two of the Bre'Tak fighting to restrain flailing limbs and tail as the third finished off the first.The __aatojuik's cries followed us both into the corridor; the shut door only muffled the sounds._

"You had better be correct that this one can be trained," the Visser snarled at me.It couldn't kill me, or at least I knew it wouldn't; I was the best damned pilot in the whole fleet of mother ships, the stress being on _damned before __pilot."If not, it will not be the only thing to lose its wings."_

"I understand, Visser," I replied, showing my neck slightly in a show of humility.My own wings twitched at the thought of losing them.I didn't like that thought - even if they _had become useless; I could not recall clearly the last time I had preened them, much less put them to their natural use._

A high-pitched squeal of pain, the first pain an _aatojuik feels, came from the room we had left, stopped, then resumed for short duration, and stopped to be replaced by the whimpering of grown creatures.One of the Bre'Tak, a pair of deep gashes across his face and only one of his three eyes remaining, the others being mere a smears of fluid mixing with his blood, hurried out of the door, the __aatojuik between two hands.She hung limply, with only short protrusions from her now bare shoulderblades.She glared at me, and I saw pain in those odd, beautiful, familiar eyes.«__Jrikvelh,» the soundless whisper came it me.«__Jrikvelh, __Jirrell.»_

They had restrained her, and now, like me, she would never be free, at least to fly.But I felt a glimmer of pride - she hadn't cried.She would - in this cursed way - live.

My Hope would live.

# CHAPTER 11

What my second daughter was, was not labeled _Aetaialaine, as I would have wished.She, and those like her, became known as __othyb - a __Galard word equivalent to monster."Vile, malformed freak" is a closer translation._

And yes, there were more to come.

I entered the room, _Arctesch at my heels, as he had been for nearly a year.It was impossible to deny that we looked much like father and son - I with my tall but haggard appearance, bent wings held high but almost lazily simply out of uselessness; the young creature with his already five foot tall height, three and a half times that of his birth.His skin had never lost its odd, black-green color.He stayed respectively quiet, but the interest of his sharp eyes, dull green in color, was plain.He held his leathery wings close to his body, out of the way.He looked at the table before him, right on his eye level.He was young yet, but often I found myself instructed to teach him to use his wings on my off-shifts.He was surprisingly bright, even at his young age._

I frowned immediately."Why are there two canisters?I was informed that this was to be the emergence of number one hundred-twelve.What is the other one?"

One of the surgeons looked up."Greetings, Grer 043.The formed 

cell unexpectedly split in two before beginning its total formation.There are actually _two 'one hundred-twelve's."_

My hearts skipped.Clones!"Which is the first?" I asked, not knowing what else to say. The surgeon pointed to the left canister.Collecting myself, I nodded quickly and ordered, "Very well.Proceed."

The surgeon gave her affirmation, then began the process.Theopaque containers began to rise, giving off the synthetic amniotic fluid.Yet again the surgeons were disappointed; like _Nrintai, these only had two toes per foot.Would these - sons, I told myself; I had discovered that the embryo had been male - two be like her, or like the third, the one with the thought-voice I had never revealed?_

The fluid continued to drain.The clone was on his feet, while the other knelt when there was too little to stand in any longer.Backward knees, as before, as it should be in any case - the original had no talons on his heels, while the clone did, albeit short ones.I frowned as the edges of wings came into view; these were like the third, like _Jrikvelh, then.Tails whipped as balance became mandatory, single-bladed ones that were frighteningly short.Three fingers and a thumb per hand.Four horns - but they were wrong.Their faces were too smooth, lacking of angles, except for their very Hork-Bajiran, beak-like mouths.Their frontmost horns pointed to their backs, like __Jrikvelh's, but they all did.All four horns, arranged unnaturally evenly around their heads in somewhat of a diamond formation, pointed backward.Thefourth was short, curved, like hers, but they were from their necks, and the others were all straight and thinner.These two were as strange as the third, stranger even.Like the third, their vertebral spines were short, but not so much as hers, while the hair plastered to their heads as well as their singular thick skin-plates were an unnatural black.The original still did not stand, and the clone tottered before falling to the metal.He didn't cry at all - he'd expected it.I sought out their eyes - the clone was the stronger, with a sharp green-yellow-eyed gaze reminiscent of __Brenjuum's original, dangerous gray-gold ones.The other glanced around constantly, then uttered a bleak, croaking cry, the kind that used to make creatures soften, take such an infant into their arms and ignore the differences from norm._

But now it was different.Such kindness was a weakness.Weakness meant death.Kindness could not be afforded anymore; it was too expensive now, made obsolete.I had never wished more that I didn't remember the times _before, when kindness was given for no price at all but thanks, some- _

times not even that.

The times before the Yeerks.

"Well?" the surgeon asked, waving disgustedly at the two _aatoju, who were trying to force their feet to stay underneath them.They were nothing to my __Jrikvelh.__Arctesch growled uncertainly under his breath, obviously not pleased with his "brothers"._

I heard her voice, soft, simplistic in her youth.She was not yet very old, after all.«They are, as I.Keep.Strong, they.»I received a sense of... of humor, of... of amusement.«Opposites._Liured, first.Ended to __Deruil.»_

I understood; _Liured was the first.The clone, __Deruil._

Opposites._Peace first, split into __war._

"Give them to their mother," I said, scowling.

_Arctesch looked up at me."What of their wings?"For his young age he was bright.Too bright."They won't work.Get rid of them."_

«Like me?Do not!»_Jrikvelh paused.«One.ONE!»_

I understood.Somehow I always did."Remove the wings from the.... the clone," I decided, waving in their general direction.Best they be taken from the stronger of the two.

_Arctesch scowled."Why?"_

«Apart.Same - apart.»

"So that they might be told apart," I replied, not looking at my oldest.I wished _Nrintai could have come instead, or better, __Jrikvelh.Despite her youth I somehow always understood the strange little thing.But to be seen with one so young would be a curiosity to the other officers.I could not afford that._

Not if I wished to be there for her, when she was old enough to speak.Old enough to understand me as I did her.

Old enough.....


	3. Chapters 12 through 17

# CHAPTER 12

Next was one hundred twenty-two.The abomination, or so I thought.

What a fool I was, about my own _aatoju._

I wished _Nrintai could have accompanied me, but she had crossed her instructors too many times - refused to cooperate, to stop looking past her sparring partners to the individuals they were, to do anything more than defend herself in what was considered a cowardly manner - and had been sent to the salvage rooms to be raised there - there was nothing I could do.She was too weak to survive elsewhere, and the salvage rooms were where the weak went to die.All my attempts to aid her covertly, all I had done with what pitiful power I held, had failed her._

I vowed not to fail anymore.Of course, all my vows since becoming this Yeerkless Controller I was had been completely empty and pointless.

I nodded."Proceed," I said curtly.The technician, accustomed now after several failures, entered the code to start the process I had memorized.The canister began to rise, the liquid draining automatically.Three-taloned feet of an odd, pale blue-green color; definitely _othyb - a freak, to put the translation kindly, as my children had been officially designated an equivalent of two Earth months prior.Nothing natural was of that color.His tail held a merged and short blade, like a mix of __Jrikvelh's and the clones - __Deruil and __Liured, the former being the clone.Two-fingered hands, like __Arctesch and all other Bayetai.A complete absence of any chest-plates whatsoever, just continuous, water-colored skin.The mouth was a beak, but perfectly straight, like that of an Earth bird called a crane. He had perfectly yellow eyes and two, Hork-Bajir-like horns, but for the fact that the one from his forehead pointed straight forward and the other pointed almost straight up,rather than having any sort of curve to them.The yellow eyes were deep-set and brooding, as if even at this age the __othyb was plotting against the Empire.The only thing natural about this one was his pale violet hair, hair like I remembered my own mother having.It made him look all the more disturbing._

The technician sighed."To their dam?"

"May as well.The other males have proven their worth - he might as well."However, for the first time I had doubts in one of my children.This one was too strange, too deeply-minded.

The voice came to me, as it tended to.«He is _Yuuktesl, __Jirrell.He may prove his worth in ways I approve of, but have not the courage to follow.»_

_What do you mean, aatojuik?I had learned that I could speak to her as well, but no others.I had felt a stirring when I tried to bespeak the other __othyb, and __Arctesch had seemed disturbed when I watched him, during one of our sessions together as I attempted to communicate - he was spending less and less time in the make-shift nursery that had been set up for my freakish __aatoju, and more among Controllers; he was old enough to be brainwashed to the Yeerks' evil.Now that he knew how to use his wings, I was instead in charge of teaching him what I knew of flying elsewise - that is, to pilot.Even in that he was disturbingly quick._

For all my attempts with the others, only _Jrikvelh had ever answered me._

«I fear his spirit is stronger than ours combined.The Yeerk Empire will not soon forget him - slave or no._»_

_How are you so certain?_

«There are times - sometimes it is enough that I know, and I wish that it weren't so.Best you have less to do with _Yuuktesl than you have with __Nrintai, __Jirrell - or your life will be at stake as well, and others need you.I might need you.We need you to remain strong, __Jirrell.It is best that __Yuuktesl remain but a memory of what you saw today - he will only become worse in time.»_

_What are you speaking of?Explain yourself!_

But, as it always was when I least wished there to be, there was no 

reply.

Little was I to know....

_Yuuktesl was the last __othyb for a long time.Three standard years, as it turned out.He went from being a freak of nature - an __othyb true to all forms of translation to the word - to a decrepit creature.From the first he was uncooperative and in all ways contrary.The reports on him reminded me greatly of __Brenjuum, but that it was impossible to goad him - it was as if he was incapable of being angry, as if he just __was.He was __Yuuktesl, nothing more._

Of course, _yuuktesl means something to the effect of "long, torturous death"._

_Yuuktesl was a creature of his own making.He utterly refused to do what he was told; when, while in combat training, he was told to attack a Hork-Bajir by a low-ranking Controller within a Gedd host, __Yuuktesl was reported to have nodded, then taken his incredibly short, two-pronged tail blade, and twitched it; there was no more Gedd officer.He lost his tail blade for that.Later, another officer, this one a Taxxon-Controller, instructed him to fix something.__Yuuktesl lost the talons on his left hand for shredding the beast because, according to him, he "didn't like his tone".There was something new to torture him over nearly every evening.Soon my naturally thin, slightly-taller-than-a-Hork-Bajir, seawater-colored fourth __othyb son was reduced to a pile of hideously-colored skin and broken or badly-healedbones, a Yeerkless slave working in salvage of any ships or debris the mother ship took in while flitting from one end of the universe to the other._

There was a bit of excitement one day, a day otherwise like any other.I was at my post."What is it?" I demanded of the on-board sensor engineer on duty at the time.

"Rrrr... Andalite ship salvaged," they replied crisply.Those in Gedd hosts tend to mince words because _Galard isn't a very comfortable language for Gedds to speak."Rrr... hopefully technology to be found."_

I thought immediately to _Yuuktesl.What would he do, if he got ahold of Andalite technology?I doubted __Nrintai would do much about it.She had not shown the same sort of independence her brother had.She had shown compassion, not independence._

The next day, as I passed the salvage bay, I saw the crews working on the badly damaged ship.It was in horrible disrepair, full of blast holes and crumpled in places as if some giant hand had reached out and crushed it like aluminum foil; it was so badly damaged I had no way of telling what model fighter it was.My eyes scanned quickly over the crew, when I saw something.Or, more precisely, _didn't see something.I didn't see __Yuuktesl's ugly greenish-blue skin among the other starving creatures.__Nrintai, with her green flesh, would have been nearly impossible to pick out, but __Yuuktesl should have been readily visible._

I paused, taking a moment to look more closely.There was no sign of _Yuuktesl anywhere; none of the two dozen or so mangled, dismembered creatures that dragged themselves wearily from different places in the bay to others were of the ugly color my son was, or had anything nearing the color of his pale violet hair.__Yuuktesl wasn't there._

I lowered my head then, closing my eyes._I didn't feel a thing, I told myself.__Have I fallen so far that even my Feelings have died?Or was his impure blood too strong?_

My brooding was interrupted by a hissing sound.I cocked my head slightly, listening.The sound came again.I turned, slowly, then returned my vision to the bay, but my hearts hammered in my chest.I made a show of stretching my wings - in spite of the great resistance they now had at any willed movement - and a furtive figure darted into safety beneath them."_Yuuktesl, I presume?" I whispered._

"Aye, sire," a surprisingly dry voice replied.It sounded as if the owner were laughing at some private joke he wouldn't tell because no one else would understand.It bore an odd accent, one that, as it turned out, was how the salvage workers spoke when necessary.I had never met any other, Yeerkless creature, but for _Arctesch, and therefore was unprepared for __Yuuktesl's accent, one that was predominant among the slaves.One, as it turned out, he faked very well."I knew 't'was you, on smell.Sight's near gone.Eyes ne'er were verr' good, an' now I've somethin' that's killin' what I've got.'Tis rather unpleasant goin' on th'other senses, but what I've to lose?I'd be rather useless if they took 'nother digit."I didn't dare look at him; his breathy voice could be attributed to the movement of my wings, his sanctuary, by any passing by.They hid his broken frame quite well.It was only later, a few weeks later, that I discovered exactly what sort of hideousness he had taken on that I was oblivious to."Thank you kindly, sire, for the sanctuary f'r now.P'haps we'd best move 'long?Worry not 'bout sight, sire, f'r I've a trait or two.Ain't a pretty thing, but I c'n move when I need to. M' body's 'alf gone, but m'mind's still proper."I moved away from the window, walking slowly, as if deep in thought, my head lowered to improve my hearing.I caught sight of a yellow eye clouded over with a thick layer of cataract but still, impossibly, focused and strong.He walked silently; after all, he had no talons to click against the flooring.Only his breathy voice and knobby body against my wing revealed his existence to me - and because those were the only proofs, he was revealed to no one but me."Bet'r," he whispered, pleased."Nex' access 'atch, sire, an' I'll be on m' way."_

"What are you to do?" I asked him.

I felt his near-toothless smile.I didn't really see that he had no teeth; I just knew that no salvage slave kept theirs for long."I'd thought to visit what relations I could trust," he said easily, even though what he said - "relations", "trust" - was of an obsolete age."You save me th' trouble o' finding you, sire.I'd thought pr'aps _Nrintai'd like a chat, maybe a game o' Dullot wi' __Jrikvelh.How is that sister o' mine?I've somethin' f'r 'er, if she's willin'."_

I didn't dare ask what he could have of interest for my Hope."I don't know," I answered truthfully.

He chuckled a little."You make it diff'cult, sire.No matter.She'll be found.Thank you kindly, sire.This's where I take leave.May the Kandrona be irreversibly damaged for you, sire."He slipped from the cover of my wing, into a garbage disposal chute.His decrepit body almost seemed to fold in upon itself as he forced himself downward.

So that was my freak-son, _Yuuktesl.__May the Kandrona be irreversibly damaged for you.A cynical parody of the Yeerk wish for good luck - __May the Kandrona shine and strengthen you.I chuckled.He was right: he wasn't the least bit attractive, but he had his mind in the right place._

# CHAPTER 13

Three years later, and another _othyb.I was supposed to be in the infirmary for some kind of treatment for all Bayetai blooded creatures, but I chose to interpret the Visser's order to oversee the "birth" of the female __othyb one hundred forty-nine as more important than that of the head of the infirmary.The medical bay was only a little down the hall from the genetics laboratory; they could wait._

She was very much Bayetajin, but unnaturally small - smaller than a Hork-Bajir would have been, even.Her skin was a shade between the two, like _Jrikvelh.She had a forward horn much like her sister, but her second and third horns, although in the same places, were shorter and straight.A fourth poked from the tip of her snout, abnormally dull and so miniscule I was surprised I had noticed it at all.Pale, tawny-orange "mane" - nothing more than a few strands growing from behind the forward horn, a darker version of the gray-gold one __Brenjuum had once had - __still had.A sharp, short snout, very beak-like but not truly a beak.Glaring pale green eyes, as if she distrusted all surrounding her, a color vaguely similar to __Vreren's but of a nature closer to __Lydyiuh's mate.She sat on the solid platform, her two-toed feet splayed out before her, three-fingered hands helping to keep her upright.A short blade rested behind her, like mine but stunted, as most __othyb had.Most surprising, however, were her wings - because she was __completely undersize, the wings were actually to scale.__Klindas!I whispered to myself, in my mind."She keeps the wings - they should serve her," I said."Send her to her dam."I frowned: it had been long since __Yuuktesl's "birth", __too long between him and this new one._

Suddenly, the ship was rocked right out from beneath my feet.Instinctively I flared my wings for balance, but it was no use; I suddenly reeled in a shock of pain, mind-numbing and all-encompassing, that made me prone on the floor.The _aatojuik slid off the table with a cry.She hit the floor, and her eyes rolled back under her low brow.My head, too, struck the floor, but my stronger skull and already benumbed senses left me only dazed._

«_Jirrell!»I almost jerked in surprise at the wail of Hope's voice.It had been so long since I had heard it, and was surprised at the intelligence it held now.How mature was she now?__Arctesch was nearing maturity.She could not be so far behind - no doubt she was full grown.How __mature, however, was a guessing game: Hork-Bajir were mature within six cycles.Bayetai took at least twenty.The __othyb could take anywhere in between._

_What is it, child? I asked distractedly.My mouth turned downward as I tried to put my hands beneath me to help right myself.My limbs didn't quite want to function properly.I had never known her to panic at the birth of her brothers.What was so different with this sister?_

That was not it, it seemed.Not at all.And the pain I had felt, more numb than an actual Feeling, was not completely part of the sudden rocking, either.«Can you not feel it?Can you_ not feel the absence?He's gone,__ Jirrell!__Yuuktesl is gone!»_

I shuddered, freezing.The numbness nearly overwhelmed me._What?No!_

«He's gone, _Jirrell.»She was whimpering.She had told me six cycles ago not to become attached to him: had she, instead?«He's gone!The martyr is gone!»_

Martyr?Where had she learned such a word as that?_Martyr?_

«He was never a sight to see, but his spirit was pure, _Jirrell.»I was surprised: she was crying for him.No one ever cried over a loss.The mourning of another's loss was from the times __before, not now.«He was not at all tainted, not like you or me.The Yeerks did nothing to him but physical harm that did not touch his spirit.But... it's gone now.His spirit is gone.Gone!»There was a sense of violent shuddering, of intense pain.«Those that fight will always know him as a martyr, __Jirrell.We will always know him to be, and all others will know.»She was quiet for a moment.I was suddenly struck with the realization that she was probably on the same deck, in the infirmary.It was nearly all I could do not to run there and see her, just once.Her voice took on a hurried note as she continued.«This is __Gloift.She is much like me, but will never near my brute strength.She'll always be compared to me, __Jirrell, and will not measure up.Make her a pilot, if you can.She'll beat me in that.But... there is something I cannot place.I think... I think she will die early, too.I must go.»Then she was gone without a trace._

"Why is she not with her dam?" I demanded.

"Grer?There is a message for you."

"Put it through."

I turned to a screen close to the door.A Hork-Bajir face greeted me, one distorted with barely-controlled panic."What are you _doing up there?" I demanded coarsely."I leave the bridge for two minutes-"_

"There is no bridge!" the Hork-Bajir screamed at me, eyes blazing."That- that _othyb - that freak-son of yours took out the bridge!The Kandronas!The main Yeerk pool!The __Visser!"I stared at them, unable to speak.What?_

"What nonsense are you talking about?" I demanded as soon as I could remember the words.  
"The only reason I haven't ordered you dead, Grer 004, is that the red-haired one's force fields are the only thing keeping the rest of us alive."

"How did that abomination destroy half the ship?!" I shouted, for the benefit of the doctors.They sat bolt upright.The _aatojuik stirred._

The Hork-Bajir glared at me."Somehow he learned of - and _managed to activate - the Mutiny Protocol."Of course - the restricted code that immediately blew the bridge and the main Yeerk pool in the event that the Controllers in the cages there managed to break free and take over."He was Draconed, but not before he managed to key in the final sequence.He should have been starved dead by now - dead for years!! - but __someone kept him alive, and we __will find out who."The scowl they wore deepened."You are the highest-ranking bridge officer still alive, __Bayetajin.What do we do?"_

"We go to the homeworld or the shipyards on the Hork-Bajir or Taxxon world - whichever of them is closest to us - and those left that might be responsible will pay for it," I replied, as if the question were foolhardy."I will be down shortly._Try to keep the rest of the mothership intact, will you, until I'm there?"I shut off the communications link before they had a chance to reply._

"You aren't even saddened by the death of your 'son'?" one of the doctors hissed sarcastically at me.

"An _othyb is dead."My voice sounded dead, too, like it didn't matter.Like it didn't matter the slightest bit to me what happened to the __othyb."What does it matter?One less __othyb.Why is it that all seem to think they would __mean something to me?" I sneered suddenly.I glared at this new one, this... this __runt, for lack of a kinder term."Get that out of here, and try again," I said."And don't dare fail so terribly.Look at it!It has the size, but nothing else."I snorted."Pathetic."With that, I left-_

-and nearly collided with Grer 074.

_Arctesch._

# CHAPTER 14

"Hello, Acting-Visser," he said amiably, showing his neck slightly."Is it another _othyb?"_

"You know it is," I snapped in reply."Now get out of my way, Grer."

"Oh, _yes, sir."_

«_Jirrell!»_

The panic in her voice made me flinch, which made me see the movement of _Arctesch's long tail blade.This allowed me to avoid it.I didn't realize until later that, for her to have warned me, she had to know who I was - and that she had to be able to see me.Once again, I just missed the opportunity to meet with my Hope, as what she had become.But, as I said, I did not realize that until much later._

I easily wrapped my fingers around _Arctesch's throat and held him off the floor."What are you __doing, waif?" I snarled."Raising yourself... against __me?"_

_Arctesch bared his teeth in threat, although his hands remained limp at his sides: he was not following through with his assassination attempt."Do not think that your __othyb are so easy to kill as you claim," he hissed."__Yuuktesl was the weakest of us, and he lived __three years without food, water, or covering.And he had been mutilated, beaten, and worse.__Jrikvelh and I are stronger than that, __sire.You'll not be killing us.Nor __Deruil, I would think."He raised his lip from his teeth more."Just try and destroy __Liured, __Jirrell, and __Deruil would make my mock attempt quite real.And quite painful, I might add."_

"You think I forced death upon _Yuuktesl?" I asked, keeping the amazement from my voice.__Arctesch thought that?Perhaps others would as well._

Good.

"Who else?" the young one sneered."Our dam?"He laughed harshly."She is simplistic.An idiot.But she loved us anyway.You are part of the Empire, and know no such thing."

"I knew a time before, fool," I hissed in reply."I knew love, once.But it is a dead thing.You'd best not hold onto such pretty trinkets, boy, if you wish to live."

"The hard part for you, _Jirrell, is that you know we are a part of you."__Arctesch was full of a quiet rage, a fire that was consuming him.The worst part about it, I knew, was that it was entirely misplaced.I was one of the few the boy could afford to trust."You are Bayetajin.And you know that we are freaks.Part enemy - and yet family.And I know you would hate us for that.You have to - you are Bayetajin."I was silent: I did not point out that, as part of the Yeerk Empire, race had no more place than love - there were only Controllers, non-Controllers, and slaves.And that the Bayetai pride the boy spoke of had been beaten out of me very long ago, on a day I would not ever forget.A day that would haunt me forever.The day I became almost alone - until this one was born.I just had not seen it that way until that very moment."You are a face._

"But _we are not, __Jirrell.We know who each of us are.We __othyb are together."He let out a wordless snarl, a vague threat."And those who kill __othyb have the rest to deal with.__Yuuktesl was suffering, he is better dead - but if you attempt __Liured or this one, __sire, then do not expect your life to be worth your rank."_

"Does she bespeak you as well, _Arctesch?" I whispered.The boy was immediately quiet."Did she tell you to have little to do with __Yuuktesl?What does she tell you now?What of your new sister?"_

_Arctesch stared at me, surprised."She is __Gloift," he murmured."You will teach her to pilot."_

"As I have you," I said under my breath."And I enjoyed that, boy.I did.I liked spending time with you.I wished I could spend time with _Nrintai, but I cannot.I wish I could spend time with __Jrikvelh, but I have found no excuse to go near her.I wish I could spend time with __Liured, but he is under the instruction of another.And like __Jrikvelh, there is no reason that I be near __Deruil, either.But I have been with you, __Arctesch.And I will be near __Gloift.No matter your threats, I will be near you both.You cannot change that."I dropped him to the floor."And no matter what you might believe," I whispered, my voice taking a note I had never used as part of the Empire, "you are not the enemy."I whirled away, to make it appear as if I had finished snarling out the lower officer."I do not hate you, boy."I continued on my way, leaving the confused __othyb behind."Sometimes I wonder," I muttered to myself, although I still addressed the "Bayetajin" who could no longer hear me, "if you were not the first __othyb, boy.Sometimes I must wonder if the first was me."_

I checked up on my "children" on my first off-shift.Actually, I checked the "results of the _Orba Project"._

So far, the third - _Jrikvelh - was the closest they had come.The wings had been right - perhaps __too small -, and the number of vertebrae, and the number of horns: but she had been too dark, with not enough digits and much, __much too tall.And those talons of hers!_

Also so far, however, was that I had been correct so far - she was as strong as a Hork-Bajir and as smart as a Bayetajin, and more agile and deadly than the two, even combined, seemed to have the right to be.But something held her back.

It took me a bit too long to find out what - her mental condition.Decidedly unbalanced, the reports told of her.She could be provoked endlessly and give no response, but at times no provocation at all ended inthe death of someone - usually higher ranked than she, I saw.There could be a method to her "madness".Each cycle brought her a micron closer to Grer status, and that to that of an officer.

I shuddered at that; I was barely able to force myself to continue.Had my Hope been somehow misnamed?How could hope rest in a mad creature?_No!I refused to believe that it could possibly be true._

Like I said, I was a rather large fool.

The Visser had considered it bad enough that _Arctesch was climbing too quickly than his age allowed, but, for another __othyb to follow him, perhaps destroy him in the end?This had pleased the Visser: it had not cared for __Arctesch all that much.His sights were set directly on what he could reach.He was a perfect officer, according to the ex-Visser - too perfect.For a non-Controller, much, __much too perfect._

I decided to keep that in mind.

# CHAPTER 15

Eventually came embryo one hundred-eighty-one.Its supervision was left to me alone: with the death of my Visser, I was the most knowledgeable in the _Orba Project and, therefore, it was left up to me to finish it.The irony of it was halfway amusing._

«He is _Juvrenz.Watch him carefully, __Jirrell.He will do us proud.»_

I listened, but _Jrikvelh said nothing more.I frowned: after so many failures, with only a dozen embryos left... yet another __othyb._

Not that this male was as small as _Gloift.In fact, he most greatly resembled __Nrintai, but that his skin was pale, paler even than hers.This one had no wings, a trait seen only in __Nrintai and __Yuuktesl before, and the two horns of a Hork-Bajir female, seen before only in his eldest sister.He had three-fingered hands and a double-edged blade that was not as short as most of the __othyb had, but stunted when compared with that of a Bayetajin.He was abnormally large when compared to a Hork-Bajir - close to the size __Jrikvelh was at birth.His eyes were an odd, pale green color.Like only __Arctesch and __Jrikvelh before him, he was able to stand immediately, but like his brother, not his sister, had not been able to remain so for more than a few moments._

_Arctesch stood beside me, nearly equal to my height, now.I glanced at him: he showed no signs of having heard __Jrikvelh."To his dam," he said as he and I turned to leave the new __othyb behind.He had been given the observing position I had once held._

"Where else?" the doctor replied with slight sarcasm, but grabbed up the _aatojuik without ceremony and rushed him away.Again, unlike __Jrikvelh and like his brother, this one didn't struggle._

"_Juvrenz," __Arctesch said."Such peculiar names she gives us, no?"I did not respond."He's a strong one.Take after the brood, I suspect."_

"_Othyb are no two alike," I answered."Look at yourself and __Yuuktesl.No relation but blood."_

_Arctesch laughed."__Liured and __Deruil have a little more in common than that."_

"But their similarities are only skin-deep, if you have not forgotten," I reminded him as I took my leave of him.

I found myself dwelling on the thought of my growing pair of identical-appearing "sons" - quiet, contemplative _Liured, whose mind worked lightbands faster than his non-existent temper, and outspoken, angry __Deruil, who let his brother do the planning and carried things out himself.Their obvious inter-dependence was often a target of attempts to destroy them both, but to no avail; truly, they were the only team of those non-Controllers - perhaps even Controllers, as well - that completely trusted each other and let everyone know it.It was as if they shared not only appearance and birth, but one mind as well._

One mind, two halves.One of contemplation, one of action.

I had managed to spend some time with _Liured.He was shorter than I had thought he would be, and his wings had surprisingly caught up with him; although their span was not at all impressive, if he should ever be given permission he would be able to learn to use them.__Liured had been an absolute surprise - soft-spoken, inquisitive, and, most of all, submissive.That he was still alive at this point was far more than a miracle._

"I don't want to fight," he had explained himself."But I can't help that."He had lowered his voice to a murmur."_Deruil is the fighter of us.I only plan out the battles - he's the one that fights them.And he's thought up something... something that scares me.I'm the one who's supposed to do the thinking... when he does it, it often goes wrong, somehow.I do not understand him, sub-Visser 098 - I trust him in all things, but understanding is something we do not need between us two."He had frowned: his snout was harshly hooked, like a Hork-Bajir's, but unnaturally short.There was a delicacy about him, with his angleless, drawn features and all back-turned horns."I do not know how to explain it.It is beyond the spoken word, what my brother and I have between us."_

I had mentioned _Jrikvelh, but __Liured knew little of her: he had seen her, yes - he knew Grer 122 by sight, but little else."Her hair is like a beacon," he had said."Absolutely stunning.She deserves a rank so much higher than what she is, sir.She is a stunning, stunning creature.Something about her denies any form of disrespect.Her claws, her tail blade... and she is __tall, sir.Near as tall as a Bayetajin.Stunning."He had scratched at his thin-skinned chest, then shifted jet-black hair over his shoulder distractedly,as if it was habit."Yes.Stunning."He had lifted his tail a little higher."Although how she is able to carry her tail, with that blade - it is a wonder, sir, her tail blade.Longer than yours.Most impressive."_

"And character?" I had inquired.

_Liured had glanced at me from odd-colored, yellow-green eyes.All the __othyb had unusual eye color - it was one of the few things that applied to all of them, not three or four."She is __Jrikvelh," he had replied quietly."Demands respect - if it is not automatically given, she earns it, or if that would not work, she proves herself... elsewise."He had looked away, his eyes going out of focus."You think __Yuuktesl was a martyr?" he had said under his breath."His life was too short to compare to what __Jrikvelh shall be."_

But when I tried to follow up on that thought afterward, _Liured did not remember saying anything on the subject of his elder sister.Nothing at all."She has red hair," he said, "and a most impressive tail blade.She's near as tall as a Bayetajin.But that is all I know.I've only seen her once or twice, and have not had reason to speak with her."_

Late that night, unable to sleep thinking of my newest "son", I forced myself to read into each and every medical file on _othyb._

_Arctesch was described as a brilliant, if somewhat suspicious, officer.He showed a preference for his own kind that bordered on a paranoia.He was unusually hardy and insisted on toning his wings everyday, giving them strength enough to carry him.He was taking a steroid serum daily, one expected to accelerate his growth into maturity, which he felt would increase his performance as an officer.After reading that I found myself unable to look at his file anymore simply out of disgust._

_Nrintai was a breeder who was expecting her first child in a few months.__Arctesch had requested any females be separated and prepared for him especially.No one had objected to it: what was the point?She, too, was unusually hardy, although not physically strong.Whereas most breeders were near-prone, toothless hags, she was still able to move about easily and had all teeth that had not been physically, rather than medically, lost.She was known to try to comfort ailing breeders, saving some without any form of medication.A request to promote her to a doctorate for this unusual ability had been denied four times.There was no recording of who made this repeated request, nor who denied it each time._

_Jrikvelh was a powerful soldier who had proven herself well but did not climb so quickly as her brother because she seemed intent on holding herself back.She was not easily goaded, but had absolutely, positively nothing against killing in self-defense, and sometimes for no reason at all.Direct attacks to her usually ended within seconds, with her unscathed.However, she sometimes lashed out without reason or provocation, taking anything and everythingwith her.A warning of caution was in her file; she was deemed mentally unsound, and rather dangerous.Strange enough, she had never become ill, only going to the infirmary for three split talons and once for a broken collar bone._

_Liured and __Deruil were inseparable, even in ailments.__Liured would always become ill whenever __Deruil was injured, and __Deruil would always become injured whenever __Liured was ill - and it was never, not __once, the other way around.For some reason, __Liured did not have the constitution most of the other__othyb had, which his clone, __Deruil, did.Conversely, __Deruil seemed more prone to accidents, while __Liured seemed immune._

_Yuuktesl's report was short.He had been subjected to the removal of his scraps of wings - actually just flaps of skin that ran down his back parallel to his vertebral spines - when he was born.All vertebral spines and talons were eventually removed as well.His horns were sanded to nothing when he attacked an officer with them.Other cases of misconduct led to the loss of all but four digits, and later the loss of an entire limb, which left him with only one finger.By the time he was mature, at six cycles, he was blind in one eye as well, and close to it in the other.Dead soon after._

_Gloift was rather uneventful.Normal childhood illnesses and injuries, although she was constantly plagued with headaches that distracted her completely until it was realized that she had suffered brain damage when she had fallen off the table at her "birth".Now she sometimes seemed to "zone out", to simply stop, but oddly it was never when she was on duty - only when she was eating, or otherwise off-duty.Although a promising pilot, this trait made everyone wary: what if she "zoned" at an integral step of locomotion, and killed everyone?_

Needless to say, _Juvrenz's files were not in existence yet.His name - Othyb One-Eight-One, as it was - wasn't even on file yet, much less any problems._

I leaned forward, looking at the readouts with a musingly blank stare._Arctesch, __Liured, and __Deruil had four horns; __Jrikvelh and __Gloift had three (__Gloift's fourth had been deemed an "anomaly", not a horn); __Nrintai, __Yuuktesl, and now __Juvrenz had been born with two.__Arctesch, __Jrikvelh, __Liured, __Deruil, and __Gloift had been born with wings; __Nrintai, __Yuuktesl (in the literal sense), and __Juvrenz had not.__Arctesch and __Jrikvelh were tall; __Nrintai, __Yuuktesl, __Liured, __Deruil, and __Gloift could not be, although __Juvrenz promised to be much larger than an ordinary Hork-Bajir.__Arctesch, __Jrikvelh, __Yuuktesl, __Gloift, and __Juvrenz had the forked forward horn of the Bayetajin, although only __Arctesch had an actual ridge of bone; __Nrintai, __Liured and __Deruil did not.Only __Nrintai and __Juvrenz had been born without vertebral spines.Only __Nrintai, __Yuuktesl, and __Gloift had not been born with some form of chest plates.Only __Nrintai, __Yuuktesl, and __Juvrenz had been born without a mane of any sort._

But all had odd skin pigmentation: _Arctesch was too dark, __Nrintai and __Juvrenz too light, and all the others some odd plateau in between, except __Yuuktesl, who had simply not fit into any description of the sort; he'd been more blue than green.All had unique eye colors. And all were as vastly different as their names.__More so than their names._

As I stared at the screen, an idea formed in my mind.

I and _Arctesch, as well as __Liured and __Deruil, could not be saved.We were too important.__Yuuktesl was dead, and __Nrintai was far beyond my reach._

But there was _Jrikvelh, who the Yeerks would be happy to be rid of, and __Gloift and __Juvrenz, who they barely recognized as existing.They could be spared._

I had an idea, based on a simple fact: the _othyb were not the __othyb at all._

All that could matter was that my children were not the freaks.

_We were not the freaks._

One last note on my identical sons.

They were, genetically, more strongly Hork-Bajir-blooded than the others, which allowed them to age quickly without the aid of steroids.One day they approached our new Visser.It was _Deruil, with the sneering expression and taunting voice he had taken to using, who suggested they be fitted with Yeerks that could allow them to find their individual potential.All __othyb, at this time, seemed completely loyal: confident, the Visser gave each of them sub-Vissers of far greater rank than I.Together they were infested._

Some in the empire suppose that their flailing was because, with their "half" Bayetajin blood, the infestation went wrong.No Bayetai can be infested without the Yeerk, and most likely the Bayetajin as well, being lost.But I know that more than that was involved: I heard them, crying out with voices I thought only _Jrikvelh had.__Deruil, his false arrogance missing and his mind triumphant as he felt the Yeerk dying in his grasp, __Liured, panicking, trying to force the Yeerk back out, scared for all four of them.They knew quite suddenly that __Liured was losing, that the Yeerk was starting to take hold.I remember with pain __Liured's request that __Deruil not let the Yeerk take him, __Deruil's shrill cries that he wouldn't let either of them be taken.As __Jrikvelh has a mind's voice, so didn't they: but thought-speech only goes to whomever it is directed to.And they had been so absolutely certain that only they two were able to hear it that I didn't hear them until then.That was the secret to their powerful alliance - they had known the other's moves as soon as the other did, and had acted appropriately._

And I remember the emptiness I felt, the sudden loss of atmosphere I could inhale.The freezing pain that wasn't real, the shock as they both swung wildly with their elbows, decapitating each other.I can never forget that taste of the losing my _othyb-aatoju.Not even __Yuuktesl's loss had been as painful as that time._

It wasn't the greatest pain I'd ever felt, of course.After all, they were only partly Bayetajin.And I'd lost far more than a mere two of my family in one day before.

And so life went on without them.

# CHAPTER 16

Supposedly, none of the remaining embryos were any good.Supposedly, _Juvrenz was to be the last.Supposedly, there would be only six __othyb - the five of mine that remained, and the one son __Nrintai had borne alive._

_Supposedly._

That was how it was until I was told there was one more.The _real last one.The last __othyb.The last viable embryo - though this one had been lost.They had said they were all gone, then "found" this one.It sounded peculiar, but it needed not be questioned.All that was needed to be known was that there was to be one more __othyb, one more child of my blood._

I didn't know what to think as I stood beside _Arctesch, as the process began, one last time.I tried not to think at all.I tried not to think of __Nrintai, who had "lost" two daughters and had one, live son.So there were six __othyb now.And soon to be seven._

But this one was the last of my children.The last of _my othyb-aatoju.The rest would be born, truly born.Like __Nrintai's children - though, for their sakes, I hoped that, like her daughters, they would not be alive._

I thought back to the birth of her first, the shock of it, and smiled faintly.The Yeerks had thought her to be Hork-Bajir, so they bred her to a promising Hork-Bajir warrior.What shock they felt to see the little corpse bearing three Bayetajin-like horns and wings, not to mention three toes.

But it had been a female.And _Nrintai wasn't giving any daughters to __Arctesch as his own private breeder.So she had killed it, choked the air from it before it could cry._

The records showed it to be stillborn._Arctesch had been told it was so.Everyone but __Jrikvelh hadn't known.And, through her, __I had known._

The cries of the doctors brought me back to reality.I uttered one of my own.

Four toes.Four!

Four!

_No... I prayed to my ancestors, most of which I had long ago forgotten.__Please, no...._

A bladeless, whip-like tail.

_No..._

Back-turned knees, mid-toned skin.Hands with four fingers, one thumb, apiece, but no talons.None.

_No...no..._

Wings that were small, but no smaller than the creature.It was smaller even than _Gloift had been._

_No, please, no..._

Finally, the face, and the truth.

A face much like _Jrikvelh's - the resemblance, in fact, was staggering.The two horns over the ear holes were relatively longer and more curved, but the rest was the same.Absolutely the same.The short mane was a pale orchid, the eyes a beautiful violet so dark as to be almost as black as its pupils._

It sat there in the silence, staring at me.It was then I heard it.

Gibberish.A questioning voice that spoke no words.Sweet and pure and absolutely meaningless.

«_No!»I jerked slightly at the strength of __Jrikvelh's "voice".«Oh,__ no, it cannot be!They__ can't have-»_

_They have, I replied, more harshly than I wished to.__They succeeded._

It was then that the doctors became cheering, dancing around, embracing one another._Arctesch regarded me with a cool expression that was none the less pleased.I forced myself to return his son's gaze.__He serves the Yeerks, I reminded himself.The once-rebellious son I had once had, the one whose __traitor-name was centered toward the Yeerks, was gone.Instead, he had grown into a traitor against his own people.He had personally led to the destruction of four Andalite Dome ships.__He would do anything for his othyb__, but he is of the Yeerk Empire, and knows nothing else, I forced myself to remember.I was talking only to myself.__He does not know the true meaning of love - only infatuation.Do not tell him of Nrintai__'s daughters.Tell him nothing Jrikvelh__ tells you._

"So it is finally done," _Arctesch said."And none too soon, either.This was to be the last."_

"Do you think I did not know that?" I muttered in reply.

_Arctesch looked to the little creature."I know how it is... Father."He had learned the word in his studies.I always felt a rage within myself when __Arctesch profaned that forgotten word."You've no more children.And any more __othyb must come from those that exist."He smiled a bit, the insane smile I had learned to healthily fear."Do not worry, __Jirrell.I will make sure there are enough that we do not die out."_

"With a daughter of your sister?" I replied.I didn't mean to sneer, but I did."Why not take some breeders of both races?It works just as well."

"No!" _Arctesch snapped."I'll not infect myself on a pure-blood.Only __othyb will be mine, and __othyb alone."_

"I'm surprised at you, then."_Arctesch glared at me and my sarcastic tone."Most your age, with that foolish goal in mind, would have snatched a sister."_

_Arctesch laughed.I had not expected him to laugh.I had not __wanted him to laugh.I had wanted him to attack, to give me cause to tear out his throat.The abomination.The disease that had come from me.The... the __traitor.He looked at the little creature once more.It - she - was trying to get on her feet, but was having no luck.She was very brittle, I noted - she looked as if the slightest jarring would break her in two, probably more, pieces.Like the slightest little thing would shatter her like micrometer- thick glass._

I remembered my awesome hope to meet our ancestor-race.I remembered the innocent fool I had been, how I would bring dignity and honor to my people by showing the utmost in respect and honor to the _orba, above that I would show even myself.But now, here one was.One whose father had been __me.Once, it would have been the greatest of honors.An honor beyond my imagining, because we Bayetai would never consider attempting genetic engineering of this unnatural nature.Now, though... now, all I could think of was how easy it would be to kill the thing.How easy, and how much I wished to.How much I wished to put that beautiful creature out of any oncoming pain, to save it from the life it was to lead._

I suppose I did honor it above myself, after all.

"_Nrintai would kill me if I entered the same room!" __Arctesch chuckled, interrupting my morbid thoughts with words I had no want nor reason to hear."And __Jrikvelh?"There was temptation there, I saw it well.I suddenly felt sickened.The boy had actually considered it?I tightened my jaw, keeping my feelings within.This is a different era, I reminded myself - brother raped sister if it suited him and he was the stronger, and vice versa.Blood ties were usually forgotten within the Yeerk Empire, among hosts and non-Controllers - although it was impossible for the __othyb, considering how few there were, and how all had the same origin.Perhaps it wasn't temptation, I told myself, but simply respect, love of a sister from a brother.Like so many other lies I told myself, I could not believe it."She is most beautiful, is she not?"_

"I haven't seen her since her birth.Haven't heard a 'word' from her since _Juvrenz's birth."_

"Oh, you would love her, Father."_Arctesch smiled a bit, then gave the equivalent of a shrug."Unfortunately, she's a sight to see, but not to be near.She's gone rather insane, you know."I couldn't keep the anger from my expression, but fortunately __Arctesch didn't notice."And rather... independent."I was startled to see the look of hunger - pride? - on the boy's face change to one of well-concealed fear."She would gore me with that tail blade of hers if I even neared her.It's rather hard to breed one raised as a soldier.Did you know that she is Grer 055 now?"_

"No, I hadn't heard that," I lied again.She had told me months before.

"And _Gloift?"He dismissed it."She is too little yet.Perhaps, when she is a pair of years or two more.But I'll not have a child.I'm not so desperate as that."He regarded me again."And you, __Jirrell?Why do you not have shared quarters?"_

"What need have I of one?" I replied disdainfully."Do you think so foolishly that you were my first, at the age I am?"_Arctesch bristled at that, but made no reply."Or do you think fourteen is not enough in my lifetime?"_

"Oh?And how many of those remain?"

I focused on my new daughter rather than my abominable son."Seven," I admitted.At least, I thought so.I was almost sure my younger son - younger _Bayetajin son, from the time before -still lived._

_Arctesch shook his head."Oh, no, Father.You have six.Six, six, six."_

My eyes narrowed unconsciously."And how do you know this?"

_Arctesch chuckled."Grer 028 met a rather... __depressing fate eight _

years ago.Or hadn't you heard?"

"Grer 028?" I echoed.The rank wasn't familiar, but I knew.

I knew what _Arctesch was saying._

Six.

Six _othyb._

I once had five, in the time before.And a mate.She hadn't been beautiful, but she had been smart and wise and all I ever wished for.I had three daughters and two sons.Pure and beautiful Bayetai.

My mate had been killed immediately.She was killed even as I watched.And as I watched, my daughters' corpses were thrown into the waste incinerators.The eldest had fought her enemies and was killed.The middle one had cried out to me in fear, and I had responded to that rather than doing what should have been done, and she died for it.My infant daughter's body, scarred with burns from a low-level Dracon beam, her form ravaged from rough handling as nothing but a pile of biomatter, her body as limp as an overcooked root.My elder son had been killed before it all; he was the first casualty.The second son had set his jaw and held onto his life while the rest of his family was murdered but for his father.His respectable father, who was broken and not the father he remembered anymore.

My wife, _Vreren.Instead of her I had a nameless breeder whom I had twice seen but nothing else.__Nrintai and __Jrikvelh were both mine rather than __Sevelde, but that they lived.There were no likenesses between __Gloift and __Klindas besides their small size and large wings.I hated to admit but could not refute that the Yeerks would have likely made __Fyvwiu just like __Arctesch.__Deruil had been comparable to __Brenjuum, as __Juvrenz seemed to be doing now, but that, strangest of all things, that __Juvrenz somehow had a sense of humor.__Brenjuum had always been a serious boy, but then, he was such an angry young Bayetajin back then.And __Lingrii had been too young to have much personality to compare to any of them._

_Sevelde, __Klindas, __Fyvwiu, __Brenjuum, __Lingrii._

_Brenjuum._

_Arctesch had arranged for __Brenjuum's death.There was no other explanation why he should know so clearly who Grer 028 had been eight years ago._

_Brenjuum._

«She has no name,_ Jirrell,» I heard __Jrikvelh tell me, but I made no reply.All I could think of was __Brenjuum.«She is strange.There is something unnatural about her.Something....personal.»She paused a moment, but continued as if she had not.«But her life is short,__ Jirrell.»There was a wave of emotion in her words, something uncertain.«She will be murdered.»_

_Good, I answered darkly.__I had five before.I should have no more _

_now._

A doctor rushed through the door.A familiar smell wafted into the room.

Five.

I shouldn't have more than five.And I wasn't going to wait for this one to die on her own time.Let the filthy Yeerks have it.I would have five _now._

I hadn't realized that I had closed my eyes._Arctesch looked amused; he probably thought I was suffering from the loss of my last tie with the time before._

But no.That wasn't it at all.

_Five._

"Take the thing to her dam!" I called over the noise of the doctors."And someone inform the Council.I have a pupil to teach."With that I turned and left.

A small creature, less than a third of my height, was receding from view on my right.They had a short, thin mane of glossy yellow, and wings that appeared too big for them.They had a sharply hooked beakish mouth and three horns, and a short tail blade with a protrusion part that was as long but not nearly as wide.

"Pilot!" I barked."To me."

"Yes, sub-Visser 102."The little thing turned smartly on the ball of one foot and quickly fell in step beside me.

"Did you know that we are related, pilot?" I asked off-handedly.

"I was not aware of it, sir," she replied."You've not mentioned it before."

My hearts pounded in my chest."I was the one that provided your Bayetai DNA, girl."

"I was not aware of it," she said again, tonelessly, without even politeness or skepticism._Gloift was not the emotional sort, of what I had seen of her."I thank you for my wings."_

I was surprised to detect something in the second statement.I noted the undeniably _cynical tone with amusement."Do you like your place here?Frankly, now.As offspring to sire."_

She frowned at me.I saw it, and nearly smiled in relief; there was spirit there, to spare.Spirit like I remembered _Sevelde having.This one was stubborn, I knew.I had always known she was impatient, but had always chosen to avoid her gaze.But her bright green eyes told me everything._

She was no happier than I was.

"Frankly, sire?" she said in her normal, blunt, toneless voice."Frankly, I wish I had half the courage of my brothers.And I speak not of that abomination sub-Visser 084."

She was of the same spirit, I realized, my hearts aching.I could not 

think of a better name to put on my now eldest son."So you would wish to fight?"

"Fight?"She snorted."There is no such thing as fight."

"What of flight?"

"There is no such thing," she said again.

"Not... necessarily.Come with me, girl."

"Where?" she demanded.

I regarded her."Does it matter where you escape to?"

"Escape?" _Gloift yelped."What?"_

"Escape," I confirmed."Do you wish for it or not?"

"Wish?"She grinned.It resembled _Arctesch's, but did not discomfort me the same way."Wish?I'd rather die than stay here.And die I will, if I am caught."She laughed."Wish?Sire, I can __taste it."_

I laughed with her.It felt good."Yes, you make me proud, _Gloift Sevelde," I said._

"_Sevelde?" she echoed, giving me a wary look._

"Someone I knew a long time ago, girl," I sighed.I couldn't believe I had laughed._Brenjuum, I whispered silently.It was not a name anymore, I knew.To me, it could never be a name again, for __Brenjuum was dead.It could only be an oath, like so many I'd made in my life.But this oath, I knew, would be one I would keep."She would be proud, too.Of both of us."_

# CHAPTER 17

I know _Arctesch far better than I could ever wish to._

I never truly met _Nrintai, though she did well for a breeder.Seven strong sons serve the Yeerk Empire with almost the same zeal as their eldest uncle.He holds a special pride in each of them; he is their father, in all things that matter.I have nothing to do with any but __Cruisra.His name is an odd mangling of __Crir - "Fire" - and __Uisa - "Dirt".There is no translation for that type of merging.__Cruisra was the only pilot-worthy one among them; he has webbed hands, though, which hinders him slightly.His toes are webbed as well; it comes from the DNA for his wings, which were removed at birth.He has a severely short mane of an unusually dark gray, closer to black, and the near-black skin of a Hork-Bajir; overall, he appears to be covered, horns to spike-tipped tail, in soot.I suppose that's a possible translation for "fire-dirt".Soot.He reminds me a little of the twins, in appearance, and sometimes he is like a merging of the two - spirited, but submissive.Angry, but equally terrified._

I only met _Liured, once.Never did I see __Deruil up close, but for at his birth.It is too late for me to ever see him as he truly was, but I can guess.I can __only guess.I know that I always will._

I never saw _Yuuktesl, not really.Met, yes, and respected.But who he was, and his appearance, are equal mysteries to me.Mysteries I shall never solve.Some things, I suppose, are better left as unknown._

_Gloift was my student until her... disappearance.According to the records, a forcefield malfunction sucked her out an airlock.There was no Feel of death when that happened.I was passed caring by then.I had my __Brenjuum Oath, then, and no matter if the records were true or not, she had her escape.I had known her well enough - stubborn, suspicious, partially talon-minded.She'd have made a fine officer if she ever learned the slightest bit of discipline.Ah, well.What matter is it what she was like?She is gone, now._

Perhaps not out an airlock.Perhaps out one, I do not know.But gone.I had kept my oath to my younger son - my oath to save as many as I could, as I had not saved him.

_Juvrenz is a bit of a shock in all things, to all creatures.A Hork-Bajir look-a-like with skin of a faded, soft olive green, far too pale to be natural, not to mention almost twice the height he would have been if his blood were pure.An operations officer.I know him now, too.He worries me, sometimes.He is cautious to a fault, but just as stubborn as his sister was.That sometimes blinds him from careless mistakes.I have saved his stunted, two-pronged tail blade far more times than I care to admit.For one his age, his rank of Grer Two is impressive, considering our present Visser is somewhat more difficult than those we've had before; of course, we've never been under a single-digit before.He only has fifty Grer.(Grer are the personal officers under Vissers.The only reason I did not revert to a rankless pilot after the mortal damage of our first mother ship was that I managed to return the heap to the Yeerk homeworld.Despite my non-Controller status, the Council of Thirteen chose to rule that I was worthy of sub-Visser status for the deed.From there, my __othyb were given the chance to do just what __Arctesch did - outrank me.)As under-Visser 83 (I've been slipping downward a lot lately; my age, and other things, are catching up to me....) I am passed such trivialities.What is peculiar about him, however, is not his ability to succeed - __Arctesch has far more advantage in that realm.It is his sense of humor.__Juvrenz, much to my surprise and possibly his discredit, has a very cynical and wisecracking nature.Insubordination would be a severe problem for him if he weren't so damned charming about it._

The last one was labeled _Orba, for lack of any other name.At times I would go to her, touch her face, her hand, but never when she was awake.I couldn't possibly bare the guilt I felt at her existence, the shame that I did not have the heart to destroy her and put her out of her future misery, if she were to open her dark violet eyes and speak to me.No, my visits were done under the cover of slumber.She was a beautiful creature, small and frail as a newborn for all her few years.She died, but not of murder, as my Hope feared she might.Something happened in the infirmary, where she spent her entire life, while she was awake; she witnessed someone virtually gore a Bre'Tak surgeon, but refused to speak a single word afterward.She was dead by morning - she'd simply stopped breathing.Many thought she just gave up.Others cried murder, to avoid admitting failure.Fingers pointed at __Jrikvelh because she had been there for a fourth split talon and for her known unpredictable nature.But there was no proof - and no injury, so those pointing talons at __Jrikvelh came upon their own dead end - so the entire project was dropped.The subject had died too soon after completion of the embryonic generation.Simply put, all that came of the two hundred embryos were ten failures.Not a good use of twenty standard years._

I did not mention my Hope's fate for a reason.I did not see her, it's true, for years upon years.Since her birth, a glimpse of crimson in a hallway might be the most I ever saw.When I was transferred, along with _Arctesch, __Jrikvelh, and __Juvrenz to the mother ship of Visser Three above the Human homeworld, I was a little perturbed at the fact that __Nrintai was shuttled along as well.But I mentally dismissed it.It was of little matter - probably that abomination __Arctesch pulling some minor threads of power.I was sent because they needed someone with a great many years of familiarity with the ship systems to fix glitches and shot systems that their current compliment were having difficulties dealing with.Turned out a tertiary motherboard to the central core had fused.Sabotage.The workmanship was definitely __shek.It made me smile softly inside, to think __Lydyiuh's four spies might still be at work.I never learned who they were._

_Juvrenz was sent to help me.__Jrikvelh and __Arctesch were sent for to help deal with the planet-side problem of Andalite terrorists.The Visser had become desperate enough to chance using sentient non-Controllers to solve a problem that did not matter to them.He was so desperate, he kept them on it even after their first failure.So very, very desperate._

But he didn't count on the fact that I was, too.

No, I was the only one who knew of my oath to _Brenjuum._

The only one who knew my plans for my children.

So far, it had worked for one._Gloift was gone, because of that oath.Alive or dead, I did not know, but gone.Out of the Empire, for good._

It was not much.But it was my start... at living again.


End file.
